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THE POSITIVE OUTCOME 
OF PHILOSOPHY 



The Nature of Human Brain Work 

Letters on Logic. The Positive 

Outcome of Philosophy 



JOSEPH DIETZGEN 



TRANSLATED BY ERNEST UNTERMANM 



WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY DR. ANTON PANNEKOEK 
TRANSLATED BY ERNEST UNTERMANN 



Edited by Eugene Dietzgen and Joseph Dietzgbk, Jr. 



CHICAGO 

CHARLES H. KERR & COMPANY 

1906 






LIBRARY of C 


ONGRESS 


Two Copies 

CC1 


Received 

i 1906 


(C<- I ft. '<?oo 

CLASS O. KXC, No. 

/S7 3 S f 

COPY B. 



copybight 1906 
By Eugene Dietzgen 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

Introduction by Anton Pannekoek 7 

The Nature of Human Brain Work 

Preface 41 

I. Introduction '. 47 

II. Pure Reason or the Faculty of Thought in General.... 61 

III. The Nature of Things 80 

IV. The Practice of Reason in Physical Science 104 

a Cause and Effect 108 

b Matter and Mind 119 

c Force and Matter .*. 124 

V. "Practical Reason" or Morality 133 

a The Wise and Reasonable 133 

b Morality and Right 143 

c The Holy 156 

Letters on Logic 

First Letter 177 

Second Letter .-. 181 

Third Letter 186 

Fourth Letter 191 

Fifth Letter 198 

Sixth Letter 205 

Seventh Letter 212 

Eighth Letter 217 

Ninth Letter 225 

Tenth Letter 230 

Eleventh Letter 236 

Twelfth Letter 242 

Thirteenth Letter 248 

Fourteenth Letter 255 

Fifteenth Letter 260 

Sixteenth Letter _ 265 

Seventeenth Letter 271 

Eighteenth Letter 277 



vi contents 

Letters ox Logic page 

Nineteenth Letter 283 

Twentieth Letter 289 

Twenty-first Letter 29G 

Twenty-second Letter 301 

Twenty-third Letter (a) 307 

Twenty-third Letter (b) 312 

Twenty-fourth Letter 318 

The Positive Outcome of Philosophy 

Preface 327 

I. Positive Knowledge as a Special Object 333 

II. The Power of Perception Is Kin to the Universe 337 

III. As to How the Intellect Is Limited and Unlimited.... 342 
TV. The Universality of Nature 348 

V. The Understanding as a Part of the Human Soul 354 

VI. Consciousness Is Endowed With the Faculty of Know- 
ing as Well as With the Feeling of the Universality 

of All Nature 363 

VII. The Relationship or Identity of Spirit and Nature.... 309 

VIII. Understanding Is Material 376 

IX. the Four Principles of Logic 381 

X. The Function of Understanding on the Religious Field 393 
XL The Distinction Between Cause and Effect Is only 

One of the Means to Facilitate Understanding 401 

XII. Mind and Matter: Which Is Primary, Which Is 
Secondary? 409 

XIII. The Extent to Which the Doubts of the Possibility 
of Clear and Accurate Understanding Have Been 
Overcome 418 

XIV. Continuation of the Discussion on the Difference 
Between Doubtful and Evident Understanding 428 

XV. Conclusion 436 



INTRODUCTION 



THE POSITION AND SIGNIFICANCE OF J. 
DIETZGEN'S PHILOSOPHICAL WORKS 

BY 

Dr. Anton Pannekoek 



In the history of philosophy we see before us the 
consecutive forms of the thoughts of the ruling classes 
of society on life and on the world at large. This class 
thought appears after the primitive communism has 
given way to a society with class antagonisms, at a stage 
when the wealth of the members of the ruling class gave 
them leisure time and thus stimulated them to turn their 
attention to the productions of the mind. The beginning 
of this thought is found in classic Greece. But it assumed 
its clearest and best developed form when the modern 
bourgeoisie had become the ruling class in capitalistic 
Europe and the thinkers gave expression to the ideas of 
this class. The characteristic mark of these ideas is dual- 
ism, that is to say the misunderstood contrast between 
thinking and being, between nature and spirit, the result 
of the mental unclearness of this class and of its inca- 
pacity to see the things of the world in their true inter- 
connection. This mental state is but the expression of the 
division of mankind into classes and of the uncompre- 

7 



8 INTRODUCTION 

hended nature of social production ever since it became 
a production of goods for exchange. 

In times of primitive communism, the conditions of 
production were clear and easily understood. Things 
were produced jointly for use and consumed in common. 
Man was master of his mode of production and thus 
master of his own fate as far as the superior forces of na- 
ture admitted it. Under such conditions, social ideas 
could not help being simple and clear. There being no 
clash between personal and social interests, men had no 
conception of a deep chasm between good and bad. 
Only the uncontrolled forces of nature stood like unintel- 
ligible and mysterious powers, that appeared to them 
either as well meaning or as evil spirits, above these primi- 
tive little societies. 

But with the advent of the production of commodities 
the picture changes. Civilized humanity begins to feel 
itself somewhat relieved from the hard and ungovern- 
able pressure of fickle natural forces. But now new de- 
mons arise out of social conditions. "No sooner did the 
producers give their products away in exchange instead 
of consuming them as heretofore, than they lost control 
of them. They no longer knew what became of their 
products, and there was a possibility that these products 
might some day be used for the exploitation and oppres- 
sion of the producers — The products rule the producers." 
(Engels) In the production of commodities, it is not the 
purpose of the individual producer which is accomplished, 
but rather that which the productive forces back of him 
are aiming at. Man proposes, but a social power, stronger 
than himself, disposes ; he is no longer master of his fate. 
The inter-relations of production become complicated and 
difficult to grasp. While it is true that the individual is 
the producing unit, yet his individual labor is only a sub--. 



INTRODUCTION 9 

ordinate part of the whole process of social production, 
of which he remains a tool. The fruits of the labor of 
many are enjoyed by a few individuals. The social co- 
operation is concealed behind a violent competitive strug- 
gle of the producers against one another. The interests 
of the individuals are at war with those of society. 
Good, that is to say the consideration of the common wel- 
fare, is opposed to bad, that is to say the sacrifice of 
everything to private interests. The passions of men as 
well as their mental gifts, after they have been aroused, 
developed, trained, strengthened, and refined in this 
struggle, henceforth become so many weapons which a 
superior power turns against their helpless possessors. 

Such were the impressions out of which thinking men 
were obliged to fashion their world-philosophy, while, at 
the same time, they were members of the possessing 
classes and had thus an opportunity to employ their leisure 
for a. certain self-study, without, however, being in touch 
with the source of their impressions, viz., the process of 
social labor which alone could have enabled them to see 
through the social origin of their ideas. Men of this class, 
therefore, were led to the assumption that their ideas 
emanated from some supernatural and spiritual power or 
that they were themselves independent supernatural pow- 
ers. This dualist metaphysical mode of thought has gone 
through various transformations in the course of time, 
adapting itself to the evolution of production beginning 
with ancient slavery, on through the serfdom of the Mid- 
dle Ages and of mediaeval commodity production, to 
modern capitalism. These successive changes of form are 
embodied in Grecian philosophy, in the various phases 
of the Christian religion, and in the modern systems of 
philosophy. 

But we must not regard these systems and religions 



10 INTRODUCTION 

for what they generally pass, that is to say, we must not 
think them to be only repeated unsuccessful attempts to 
formulate absolute truth. They are merely the incarna- 
tions of progressive stages of better knowledge acquired 
by the human mind about itself and about the universe. 
It was the aim of philosophical thought to find satisfaction 
in understanding. And as long as understanding could not 
wholly be gotten by natural means, there remained always 
a field for the supernatural and incomprehensible. But 
by the painstaking mental work of the deepest thinkers, 
the material of science was ceaselessly increased, and the 
field of the supernatural and incomprehensible was ever 
more narrowed. And this is especially the case since the 
progress of capitalist production has promoted the per- 
sistent study of nature. For through this study the hu- 
man mind was enabled to test its powers by simple, quiet, 
persistent and fruitful labor in the search for successive 
parts of truth, and thus to rid itself from the overirritation 
of hopeless quest after absolute truth. The desire to as- 
certain the value of these new truths gave rise to the 
problems of the theory of understanding. The attempts 
to solve these problems form a permanent part of modern 
systems of philosophy, which represent a graduated 
evolution of the theory of understanding. But the super- 
natural element in these systems prevented their perfec- 
tion. 

Under the impulse of the technical requirements of 
capitalism, the evolution of natural sciences became a 
triumphal march of the human mind. Nature was sub- 
jugated first through the discovery of its laws by the 
human mind, and then by the material subordination of 
the known forces of nature to the human will in the ser- 
vice of our main object, the production of the necessaries 
of life with a minimum expenditure of energy. But this 



INTRODUCTION 11 

bright shining light rendered, by contrast, the gloom 
which surrounded the phenomena of human society only 
the darker, and capitalism in its development still accen- 
tuates this contrast, as it accentuates and thus renders 
more easily visible and intelligible all contrasts. While 
the natural sciences dispensed with all mysterious secrecy 
within their narrower domain, the darkness shrouding 
the origin of ideas still offered a welcome refuge to the 
belief in miracles on the spiritual field. 

Capitalism is now approaching its decline. Socialism 
is near. And the vital importance of this transition in 
human history cannot be stated more strongly than in 
the words of Marx and Engels: "This concludes the 
primary history of man. He thereby passes definitely out 
of the animal kingdom." The social regulation of pro- 
duction makes man fully the master of his own fate. No 
longer does any mysterious social power then thwart his 
plans or jeopardise his success. Nor does any mysterious 
natural force control him henceforth. He is no longer 
the slave, but the master of nature. He has investigated 
its effects, understands them, and presses them into his 
service. For the first time in his history he will then be 
the ruler of the earth. 

We now see that the many centuries that filled the 
history of civilization were a necessary preparation for 
socialism, a slow struggle to escape from nature's slavery, 
a gradual increase of the productivity of labor, up to the 
point where the necessaries of life for all may be ob- 
tained almost without exertion. This is the prime merit 
of capitalism and its justification, that after so many cen- 
turies of hardly perceptible progress it taught man to 
conquer nature by a rapid assault. At the same time it 
set loose the forces of production and finally transformed 
and bared the springs of the productive process to such 



12 INTRODUCTION 

a degree that they easily could be perceived and grasped 
by the human mind ; this was the indispensible condition 
for the control of this process. 

As never since the first advent of production of com- 
modities there has been such a fundamental revolution, 
it must necessarily be accompanied by an equally funda- 
metal spiritual revolution. This economic revolution is 
the conclusion of the long period of class antagonisms 
and of production of commodities ; it carries with it the 
end of the dualist and supernatural thoughts arising from 
this source. The mystery of social processes passes away 
with this period, and the spiritual expression of these mys- 
teries must necessarily disappear with it. The slow de- 
velopment of human thought from ignorance to an ever 
increased understanding thereby ends its first chapter. 
This signifies the completion and conclusion of philosophy, 
which is equivalent to saying that philosophy as such 
passes out of existence, while its place is taken by the 
science of the human mind, a part of natural science. 

A new system of production sheds its light into the 
minds of men already before it has fully materialized. 
The same science which teaches us to understand and 
thereby to control the social forces, also unfetters the 
mind from the bewitching effects of those forces. It 
enables him even now already to emancipate himself 
from traditional superstitions and ideas which were for- 
merly the expression of things unknown. We may an- 
ticipate with our mind the coming time. And thus the 
ideas which will then dominate are already even now 
growing within us in a rudimentary form corresponding 
to the present actual economic development. By this 
means we are even now enabled to overcome the capitalist 
philosophy in thought and to soberly and clearly grasp 
the matter-dependent nature of our spirit. , 



INTRODUCTION 13 

The completion and the end of philosophy need not 
wait for the realization of socialist production. The new 
understanding does not fall from heaven like a meteor. 
It develops with the social-economic development, first 
imperfectly and imperceptibly, in a few thinkers who 
most strongly feel the breath of the approaching time. 
With the growth of the science of sociology and with 
that of its practical application, the socialist labor move- 
ment, the new understanding simultaneously spreads and 
gains ground step by step, waging a relentless battle 
against the traditional ideas to which the ruling classes 
are clinging. This struggle is the mental companion of 
the social class struggle. 

The methods of the new natural science had already 
been practiced for a few centuries before the new theory 
was formulated. It first found vent in the expression of 
surprise at the great confidence with which men assumed 
to predict certain phenomena and to point out their con- 
nections. Our experience is limited to a few successive 
observations of the regularity or coincidence of events. 
But we attribute to natural laws, in which are expressed 
causal relations of phenomena, a general and necessary 
applicability which far exceeds our experience. The 
English thinker Hume was the first who clearly expressed 
and formulated the question — since called the problem 
of causality — why men always act in this manner. But as 
he believed the reason for such action should be sought in 
the nature of experience alone, experience being the only 
source of knowledge, and as he did not further investi- 
gate the special and distinct part played by the nature of 
the human mind in this experiential connection, he could 
not find any satisfactory answer. 

Kant, who made the first important step toward the 



14 INTRODUCTION 

solution of this question, had been trained in the school 
of rationalism which then dominated in Germany and 
which represented an adaptation of mediaeval scholasti- 
cism to the requirements of increased knowledge. Starting 
from the thesis that things which are logical in the mind 
must be real in nature, the rationalists formulated by 
mere deduction general truths about god, infinity and im- 
mortality. Under the influence of Hume, Kant became 
the critic of rationalism and thus the reformer of phi- 
losophy. 

The question, how it is that we have knowledge of 
generally applicable laws in which we have implicit con- 
fidence — such as mathematical theses, or the maxim that 
every change has a cause — was answered by Kant in this 
way : Experience and science are as much conditioned 
on properties inherent in the organization of our mind as 
on the impressions of the outer world. The former prop- 
erties must necessarily be contained in all experience 
and science. Therefore everything dependent on this 
common mental part of science must be perfectly certain 
and independent of special sense impressions. Common 
to all experience, and inseparable from it, are the pure 
sense-conceptions (reine Anschauungsformen) , such as 
space and time, while the many experiences, in order to 
succeed in forming understanding and science, must be 
connected by the pure mind-conceptions (reine, Ver- 
standesbegriffe), the so-called categories; among the lat- 
ter also belongs causality. 

Now Kant explains the necessity and general ap- 
plicability of the pure sense and mind conceptions by the 
fact that they arise from the organization of our mind. 
Accordingly, the world appears to the senses as a suc- 
cession of phenomena in time and space. Our 
reason transforms these phenomena into things which 



INTRODUCTION 15 

are welded into one aggregate nature by laws of cause 
and effect. On the things as they really are in them- 
selves, in the opinion of Kant, these pure conceptions 
cannot be applied. We know nothing of them and can 
neither perceive nor reconstruct them by reason, because 
"in themselves" they are wholly beyond reason and 
knowledge. 

The result of this investigation, which was the first 
valuable contribution to a scientific theory of understand- 
ing and forms, from our standpoint, the most important 
part of Kant's philosophy, served him mainly as a means 
of answering the following questions : What is the 
value of knowledge which exceeds experience? Can 
we, by mere deduction through concepts which go be- 
yond experience, arrive at truths ? His answer was : 
No, and it was a crushing blow to rationalism. We 
cannot exceed the boundaries of experience. By expe- 
rience alone can we arrive at science. All supposed 
knowledge about the unlimited and infinite, about con- 
cepts of pure reason, called Ideas by Kant, (as the soul, 
the world, and God) is nothing but illusions. The con- 
tradictions in which the human mind becomes involved 
whenever it applies the categories outside of experience 
to such subjects, are manifested in the fruitless strife 
between the philosophical systems. Metaphysics as a 
science is impossible. 

This did not give the deathblow to rationalism alone, 
but also to bourgeois materialism which reigned among 
the French radical thinkers. Kant's researches refuted 
the negative as well as the positive assertions anent the 
supernatural and infinite. This cleared the field for faith, 
for intuitive conviction. God, freedom and immortality 
are concepts the truth of which cannot be proved by rea- 
son, like the natural truths derived from experience. 



16 INTRODUCTION 

But nevertheless their reality is no less certain, only it 
is of a different nature, being subjective and, therefore, 
necessarily a matter of personal conviction. The free- 
dom of the will, for instance, is not a knowledge gained 
by experience, because experience never teaches us 
anything but lack of freedom and dependence on the 
laws of nature. But nevertheless freedom of will is a 
necessary conviction of every one who feels it in the 
categorical imperative : Thou shalt ! of every one pos- 
sessed by a sense of duty and of the knowledge that he 
can act accordingly ; therefore freedom of will is uncon- 
ditionally certain and requires no proof by experience. 
And from this premise there follows in same way the 
assurance of the immortality of the soul and of the ex- 
istence of God. It gives the same kind of certainty to 
all ideas which were left in a state of uncertainty by the 
critique of pure reason. At the same time freedom of 
will determines the form of the theory of understanding. 
In the entire world of phenomena there was no room for 
freedom, for these phenomena follow strict rules of 
causality, as demanded by the organization of our mind. 
Therefore it was necessary to make room for freedom 
of will somewhere else, and so ''things in themselves," 
hitherto a phrase without value and meaning, assumed a 
higher importance. They were not bound to space, time 
or categories, they were free ; they formed so to say a 
second world, the world of noumena, which stood be- 
hind the world of phenomena and which solved the con- 
tradiction between the lawful dependence of things in 
nature and between the personal conviction of freedom 
of will. 

These opinions and reasonings were fully in accord 
with the conditions of science and the economic devel- 
opment of Kant's time. The field of nature was left 



INTRODUCTION IT 

entirely to the inductive method of science which based 
itself on strictly materialist experience and observation, 
classifying things systematically in their causal order 
and excluding all supernatural interference. But while 
faith was banished from the natural sciences forever, it 
could not be dispensed with. The ignorance as to the 
origin of the human will left room for a supernatural 
ethic. The attempts of the materialists to exclude the 
supernatural also from this field failed. The time had 
not come as yet for a materialist and natural ethics, for 
science was not yet able to demonstrate as an indis- 
putable truth, founded on experience, in what manner 
ethical codes and moral ideas in general had a material 
origin. 

This state of things shows that the Kantian philoso- 
phy is the purest expression of bourgeois thought, and 
this is still more emphasized by the fact that freedom is 
the center of his system and controls it. Rising capital- 
ism required freedom for the producers of commodities 
in order to expand its productive forces, it required free- 
dom of competition and freedom of unlimited exploi- 
tation. The producers of commodities should be free 
from all fetters and restrictions, and unhampered by 
any coercion, in order that they could go, under the sole 
direction of their own intelligence, into free compe- 
tition with their fellow citizens. For this reason, free- 
dom became the slogan of the young bourgeoisie aspir- 
ing to political power, and Kant's doctrine of the free 
will, the basis of his ethics, was the echo of the approach- 
ing French Revolution. But freedom was not absolute; 
it was to be dependent on the moral law. It was not to 
be used in the quest for happiness, but in accord witti 
the moral law, in the service of duty. If the bourgeois 
society was to exist, the private interest of the indi- 



18 INTRODUCTION 

vidual must not be paramount, the welfare of the entire 
class had to be superior to that of the individual, and the 
commandments of this class had to be recognized as 
moral laws taking precedence over the quest for happi- 
ness. But for this very reason, these moral laws could 
never be fully obeyed, and every one found himself 
compelled to violate them in his own interest. Hence 
the moral law existed only as a code which could never 
be fulfilled. And so it stood outside of experience. 

In Kant's ethics the internal antagonism of bour- 
geois society is reflected, that antagonism which is the 
compelling force of the ever increasing economic devel- 
opment. The foundation of this antagonism is the an- 
tagonism, already mentioned, between the individual 
and social character of production that gives rise to 
omnipotent, but unconceived social forces ruling the 
destiny of man. In capitalistic production it is still in- 
tensified by the antithesis of the wealthy ruling class and 
the poor producing class that is continuously augmented 
by those who are expropriated by competition. This an- 
tagonism gives rise to the contradiction between the 
aims of men and the results achieved, between the de- 
sire of happiness and the misery of the great mass. It 
is the basis of the contradiction between virtue and vice, 
between freedom and dependence, between faith and 
science, between phenomenon and "thing itself." It is 
at the bottom of all contradictions and of the entire pro- 
nounced dualism of the Kantian philosophy. These 
contradictions are to blame for the downfall of the sys- 
tem, and the work of disintegration was unavoidable 
from the moment that the contradictions of the bour- 
geois production became apparent, that is to say imme- 
diately after the political victory of the bourgeoisie. 
The system of Kant could, however, not be overcome, 



INTRODUCTION 19 

unless tHe material origin of morality could be un- 
covered. Then these contradictions could be understood 
and solved by showing that they were relative and not 
absolute as they appeared. And not until then could a 
materialist ethics, a science of morality, drive faith 
from its last retreat. This was at last accomplished by 
the discovery of social class struggles and of the nature 
of capitalist production, by the pioneer work of Karl 
Marx. 

The practice of developed capitalism about the mid- 
dle of the 19th century directly challenged proletarian 
thinkers to criticise Kant's doctrine of practical reason. 
Bourgeois ethics and freedom manifested themselves in 
the form of freedom of exploitation in the interest of the 
bourgeoisie, as slavery for the working class. The main- 
tenance of human dignity appeared in reality as the bru- 
talization and degradation of the proletarians, and the 
state founded on justice proved to be nothing but the 
class state of the bourgeoisie. And so it was seen that 
Kant's sublime ethics, instead of being the basis in all 
eternity of human activity in general, was merely the 
expression of the narow class interests of the bourgeoisie. 
This proletarian criticism was the first material for a 
general theory, and once it had been stated, its correct- 
ness was demonstrated more and more by the study of 
previous historical events, and these events were there- 
by shown in their proper light. It was then understood 
by this theory that the social classes, distinguished by 
their position in the process of production, had different 
and antagonistic economic interests, and that each class 
did necessarily regard its own interest as good and sacred. 
These general class interests were not recognized in 
their true character but appeared to men in the guise of 
superior moral motives; in this form they crowded the 



20 INTRODUCTION 

special individual interests into the background, and 
since the class interests were generally felt, all the mem- 
bers of the same class recognized them. Moreover, a 
ruling class could temporarily compel a defeated or sup- 
pressed class to recognize the class interests of the rul- 
ers as a moral law, so long as the inevitability of the 
mode of production in which that class ruled was ac- 
knowledged. Owing to the fact that the nature and 
significance of the productive process was not under- 
stood, the origin of human motives could not be discov- 
ered. They were not traced back to experience, but 
simply felt directly and intuitively. And consequently 
they were thought to be of a supernatural origin and 
eternal duration. 

Not only the moral codes, but also other products of 
the human mind, such as religion, science, arts, phi- 
losophy, were then understood to be intimately connected 
with the actual material conditions of society. The 
human mind is influenced in all its products by the en- 
tire world outside of it. And thus the mind is seen to be 
a part of nature, and the science of the mind becomes 
a natural science. The impressions of the outer world 
determine the experience of man, his wants determine 
his will, and his general wants his moral will. The 
world around him determines man's wants and impres- 
sions, but these, on the other hand, determine his will 
and activity by which he changes the world ; this will- 
directed activity appears in the process of social produc- 
tion. In this manner man by his work is a part, a link 
in the great chain of natural and social development. 

This conception overturns the foundations of phi- 
losophy. Since the human mind is seen now to be a part 
of nature and interacts with the rest of the world ac- 
cording to laws which are more or less known, it is 



INTRODUCTION 21 

classed among* Kant's phenomena. There is no longer 
any need of talking about noumena. Thus they do 
not longer exist for us. Philosophy then reduces itself 
to the theory of experience, to the science of the human 
mind. It is at this point that the beginning made by 
Kant had to be farther developed. Kant had always 
separated mind and nature very sharply. But the un- 
derstanding that this separation should only be made 
temporarily for the purpose of better investigation, and 
that there is no absolute difference between matter and 
mind made it possible to advance the science of thought 
processes. However, this could be accomplished only by a 
thinker who had fully digested the teachings of socialism. 
This problem was solved by Joseph Dietzgen in his work 
on "THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK," 
the first edition of which appeared in 1869, and by this 
work he won for himself the name of philosopher of the 
proletariat. This problem could be solved only by the help 
of the dialectic method. Therefore, the idealist philo- 
sophical systems from Kant to Hegel which consist 
chiefly in the development of the dialectic method, must 
be regarded as the indispensable pioneers and precursors 
of Dietzgen's proletarian philosophy. 

The philosophy of Kant necessarily broke down on 
account of its dualism. It had shown that there is safety 
only in finite and material experience, and that the mind 
becomes involved in contradictions whenever it ventures 
beyond that line. The mind's reason calls for absolute 
truth which cannot be gotten. Hence the mind is grop- 
ing in the dark and critique may perhaps explain why it 
is in the dark, but it cannot show the way out. What is 
called with Kant dialectics is in reality resignation. True, 
the mind finds knowledge about things outside of experi- 



22 INTRODUCTION 

ence by some other way, viz., by means of its moral con- 
sciousness, but this intuitive knowledge in the form of 
faith remains sharply separated from scientific under- 
standing. It was the task of the philosophical develop- 
ment immediately after Kant, to do away with this sharp 
separation, this unreconciled contradiction. This de- 
velopment ended with Hegel ; its result was the un- 
derstanding that contradiction is the true nature of ev- 
erything. But this contradiction cannot be left to stand 
undisturbed, it must be solved and still retained in a 
higher form, and thus be reconciled. Therefore the 
world of phenomena cannot be understood as being at 
rest. It can be understood only as a thing in motion, as 
activity, as a continuous change. Action is always the 
reconciliation of contradiction in some higher form, and 
contradiction appears in this way as the lever of progres- 
sive development. That which accomplishes this dialec- 
tic self-development does not appear in the idealistic sys- 
tems as the material world itself, but as the spiritual, the 
idea. In Hegel's philosophy, this conception assumes 
the form of a comprehensive system outlining the self- 
development of the Absolute which is spiritual and is 
identical with God. The development of this Abso- 
lute takes place in three stages ; in its primitive pure 
spiritual form it develops out of its undifferentiated 
being the conceptions of logic; then it expresses itself 
in another, an external form, opposite to itself, as Nature. 
In nature all forms develop by way of contradictions 
which are eliminated by the development of some 
higher form. Finally the Absolute awakens to con- 
sciousness in nature in the form of the human mind 
and reaches thus its third stage, at which the opposite 
elements, matter and spirit, are reconciled into a 
unity. The human mind evolves in the same way to 



INTRODUCTION 23 

ever higher stages, until it arrives, at the end of its 
development by understanding itself, that is to say, by 
knowing intuitively the Absolute. This is what happens 
unconsciously in religion. Religion, which in the form of 
faith must be satisfied with a modest corner in the 
system of Kant, appears in the system of Hegel very 
proudly as a higher sort of understanding superior to 
all other knowledge, as an intuitive knowledge of abso- 
lute truth (God). In philosophy this is done con- 
sciously. And the historical development which finds 
its conclusion and climax in the Hegelian philosophy 
corresponds to the logical development of the human 
mind. 

Thus Hegel unites all sciences and all parts of the 
world into one masterly system in which the revolu- 
tionary dialetics, the theory of evolution, that consid- 
ers all finite things as perishable and transitory, is 
given a conservative conclusion by putting an end to 
all further development when the absolute truth is 
reached. All the knowledge of that period was as- 
signed to its place somewhere in this system, on one 
of the steps of the dialectic development. Many of the 
conceptions of the natural sciences of that day, which 
later on were found to be erroneous, are there present- 
ed as necessary truths resting on deduction, not on ex- 
perience. This could give the impression that the He- 
gelian philosophy made empirical research superfluous 
as a source of concrete truths. This appearance is to 
blame for the slight recognition of Hegel among nat- 
uralists; in natural sciences, this philosophy therefore 
has won much less importance than it deserved and 
than it might have won, if its actual significance, which 
consists in the harmonious connection between widely 



2-i INTRODUCTION 

separated events and sciences, had been better under- 
stood under its deceptive guise. 

On the abstract sciences the influence of Hegel was 
greater, and here he held an exceptionally prominent 
position in the scientific world of that time. On one 
hand, his conception of history as a progressive evolu- 
tion in which every imperfect previous condition is re- 
garded as a necessary phase and preparation for sub- 
sequent conditions and thus appears natural and rea- 
sonable, was a great gain for science. On the other 
hand, his statements on the philosophy of law and re- 
ligion met the requirements and conceptions of his 
time. In his philosophy of law, the human mind is 
taken in that stage in which it steps into reality, hav- 
ing as its principal characteristic a free will. It is 
first considered as a single individual which finds its 
freedom incorporated in its property. This person- 
ality enters into relations with others like it. Its free- 
dom of will is thereby expressed in moral laws. By 
combining all individuals into one aggregate whole, 
their contradictory relations are merged into the social 
units, viz., the family, the bourgeois society (biirger- 
liche Gesellschaft) and the state. There the moral 
rules are carried from the inner to the outer reality. 
As the expressions of a superior, common and more 
general will, they stand forth in the generally accepted 
moral codes, in the natural laws of bourgeois society 
and in the authoritative laws of the state. In the 
state, the highest form of which is the monarchy, the 
mind finds itself at its highest stage of objective real- 
ization as the idea of the state. 

The reactionary character of Hegelian philosophy 
is not merely a superficial appearance that rests on the 
glorification of state and royalty, thanks to which this 



INTRODUCTION 25 

philosophy was raised to the position of Prussian 
state philosophy after the restauration. It was in 
its very essence a product of reaction which in those 
days represented the only possible advance after the 
revolution. This reaction was the first practical crit* 
ique of bourgeois society. After this society had been 
firmly established, the relative amenities of the old 
time appeared in a better light, because the shortcom- 
ings of the new society made themselves soon 
felt. The bourgeoisie had recoiled before the conse- 
quences of its revolution, when it recognized that 
the proletariat was its barrier. It arrested the revolu- 
tion as soon as its bourgeois aims had been accom- 
plished, and it was willing to acknowledge again 
the mastery of the feudal state and monarchy, pro- 
vided they would protect it and serve its interests. 
The feudal powers that previously had been overcome 
by the weight of their own sins and by the uncondi- 
tional superiority of the new social order, again lifted 
their heads when the new order in its turn gave cause 
for well founded criticisms. But they could not keep 
the revolution in check, unless they recognized it in a 
limited degree. They could once more rule over the 
bourgeoisie, provided they compromised with it so far 
as it was inevitable. They could no longer prevail 
against capitalism, but they could govern for it. Thus, 
by their rule, the imperfectness of capitalism was re- 
vealed. 

The theory of restauration, therefore, had to con- 
sist first of all of a thorough critique of the revolu- 
tionary bourgeois philosophy. But this philosophy 
could not be thrown aside entirely. So far as a crit- 
ique of the old order was concerned, the truth of bour- 
geois philosophy had to be admitted. On the other 



26 INTRODUCTION 

hand, the sharp distinction it made between the fal- 
sity of the old and the truth of the new order was 
found to be beside the mark. So the correctness of 
the bourgeois philosophy itself proved to be relative 
and limited, like that of a herald of some higher truth 
which in its turn would acknowledge that which was 
temporarily and partially true in its vanquished pre- 
cursor. In this way the contradictions became moments 
in the evolution of absolute truth, in this way, further- 
more, the dialectics became the main feature and method 
of post-Kantian philosophy ; and in this way, finally, the 
theorists of the reaction were the men who steered philos- 
ophy over new courses and who thereby became the har- 
bingers of socialism. Scepticism and a critique of all 
traditional things, yet a careful protection of endan- 
gered faith, had characterized the tendencies of bour- 
geois thought during its revolutionary period. In the 
reactionary stage, the bourgeois implicitly accepted 
the belief in absolute truth and cultivated a self-right- 
eous faith. The practice of Metternich and of the 
Holy Alliance corresponded to the theory of Hegelian 
philosophy. 

The practice of the Prussian police state, which 
embodied the shortcomings of capitalism without its 
advantages and thus represented a higher degree of re- 
action, destroyed the Hegelian philosophy, as soon as 
the practices of maturing capitalism began to rebel 
against the fetters by which reaction endeavored to 
bind it. Feuerbach returned in his critique of relig- 
ion from the fantastical heights of abstraction to physi- 
cal man. Marx demonstrated that the reality of bour- 
geois society expresses itself in its class antagonisms 
which herald its imperfectness and approaching down- 
fall, and he discovered that the actual historical de- 



INTRODUCTION 27 

velopment rested on the development of the process 
of material production. The absolute spirit that was 
supposed to be embodied in the constitution of the 
despotic state before the March revolution now re- 
vealed itself as the narrow bourgeois spirit which re- 
gards bourgeois society as the final aim of all histor- 
ical development. The Hegelian statement that all 
finite things carry within themselves the germ of 
their own dissolution came home to his own philoso- 
phy, as soon as its finiteness and limitations had been 
grasped. Its conservative form was abandoned, but 
its revolutionary content, the dialectics, was pre- 
served. The Hegelian philosophy was finally super- 
seded by dialectic materialism which declares that ab- 
solute truth is realized only in the infinite progress of 
society and of scientific understanding. 

This does not imply a wholesale rejection of Hege- 
lian philosophy. It merely means that the relative va- 
lidity of that philosophy has been recognized. The 
vicissitudes of the absolute spirit in the course of its 
self-development are but a fantastical description of 
the process which the real human mind experiences 
in its acquaintance with the world and its active par- 
ticipation in life. Instead of the evolution of the ab- 
solute idea, the dialectics henceforth becomes the sole 
correct method of thought to be employed by the real 
human mind in the study of the actual world and for 
the purpose of understanding social development. The 
great and lasting importance of Hegel's philosophy, 
even for our own time, is that it is an excellent theory 
of the human mind and of its working methods, pro- 
vided we strip off its transcendental character, and 
that is far excels the first laborious contributions of 
,Kant to the theory of understanding. 



28 INTRODUCTION 

But this quality of the Hegelian philosophy could 
not be appreciated, until Dietzgen had created the ba- 
sis for a dialectic and materialistic theory of under- 
standing. The indispensable character of dialectic 
thought, which is illustrated by the monumental works 
of Marx and Engels, has been first demonstrated in 
a perfectly convincing manner by Dietzgen's critical 
analysis of the human force of thinking. It was only 
by means of this method of thought — of which he was 
according to Engels' testimony an independent dis- 
coverer — that he could succeed in completing the 
theory of understanding and bringing it to a close for 

the time being. 

************ 

If we refer to the ideas laid down by Dietzgen in 
this work as "his philosophy," we say too much, be- 
cause it does not assume to be a new system of phil- 
osophy. Yet, on the other hand, we should not say 
enough, because it would mean that his work is as 
passing as the systems before it. It is the merit of 
Dietzgen to have raised philosophy to the position of 
a natural science, the same as Marx did with history. 
The human faculty of thought is thereby stripped of 
its fantastic garb. It is regarded as a part of nature, 
and by means of experience a progressive understand- 
ing of its concrete and ever changing historical na- 
ture must be gained. Dietzgen's work refers to itself 
as a finite and temporary realization of this aim, just 
as every new theory in natural science is a finite and 
temporary realization of its aims. This realization 
must be further improved and perfected by successive 
investigations. This is the method of natural science; 
philosophical systems, on the contrary, pretended to 
give absolute truth, that could not be improved upon. 



INTRODUCTION 29 

Dietzgen's work is fundamentally different from these 
former philosophies, and more than they, because it 
wishes to be less. It presents itself as the positive 
outcome of philosophy toward which all great thinkers 
have contributed, seen by the sober eyes of a socialist 
and analyzed, recounted and further developed by 
him. At the same time, it attributes to previous sys- 
tems the same character of partial truths and shows 
that they were not entirely useless speculations, but 
ascending stages of understanding naturally related, 
which contain ever more truth and ever less error. 
Hegel had likewise entertained this broader view, 
but with him this development came to a self-contra- 
dictory end in his own system. Dietzgen also calls 
his own conception the highest then existing, and its 
distinctive step in the evolution is that it for the first 
time adopts and professes this natural and scientific 
view, instead of the supernatural point of view of the 
former systems. The new understanding that the hu- 
man mind is a common and natural thing is a decisive 
step in the progressive investigation of the mind, and 
this step places Dietzgen at the head of this evolu- 
tion. And it is a step which cannot be retraced, be- 
cause it signifies a sober awakening after centuries of 
vain imaginings. Since this system does not pretend 
to be absolute truth, but rather a finite and temporal 
one, it cannot fall as its predecessors did. It -repre- 
sents a scientific continuation of former philosophies, 
just as astronomy is the continuation of astrology and 
of the Pythagorean fantasies, and chemistry the con- 
tinuation of alchemy. It takes the place that formerly 
was held by its unscientific predecessors and has this 
in common with them, apart from its essential theory 
of understanding, that it is the basis of a new world- 



30 INTRODUCTION 

philosophy, of a methodical conception of the uni- 
verse. 

This modern world-philosophy (Weltanschauung), 
being a socialist or proletarian one, takes issue with 
the bourgeois conceptions; it was first conceived ars a 
new view of the world, entirely opposite to the ruling 
bourgeois conceptions, by Marx and Engels, who 
developed its sociological and historical contents; its 
philosophical basis is here developed by Dietzgen; its 
real character is indicated by the terms dialectic and 
materialist. By its core, historical materialism, it 
gains a wholly new theory of social evolution that 
forms its chief content. This theory was for the first 
time sketched in its main outlines in the Communist 
Manifesto, and later on fully developed in a number 
of other works and thoroughly vindicated by innu- 
merable facts. It gives us the scientific assurance that 
the misery and imperfectness of present society, 
which bourgeois philosophy regards as inevitable and 
natural, is but a transitory condition, and that man 
will within measurable time emancipate himself from 
the slavery of his material wants by the regulation of 
social production. By this certainty socialism is put 
on an eminence so far above all bourgeois conceptions 
that these appear barbarous in comparison with it. 
And what is more significant, our world-philosophy 
may justly claim to have for the first time thrown the 
light of an indisputable science on society and man; 
combined with the maturest products of natural 
sciences it forms a complete science of the world, 
making all superstitions superfluous, and thus involv- 
ing the theoretical emancipation, that is to say the 
emaancipation of the mind. The science treating of 
the human mind forms the essence and foundation of 



INTRODUCTION 31 

this theory of society and man, not only because it 
gives us the same as the natural sciences a scientific 
or experience-proven theory of the function of human 
thinking, but also, because this theory of cognition 
can alone assure us that such sciences are able to fur- 
nish us an adequate picture of the world, and that any- 
thing outside of them is mere fantasy. For this rea- 
son we owe to Dietzgen's theory of cognition the firm 
foundation of our world-philosophy. 

Its character is primarily materialistic. In contra- 
distinction to the idealist systems of the most flour- 
ishing time of German philosophy which considered 
the Mind as the basis of all existence, it starts from 
concrete materialist being. Not that it regards mere 
physical matter as its basis ; it is rather opposed to the 
crude bourgeois materialism, and matter to it means 
everything which exists and furnishes material for 
thought, including thoughts and imaginations. Its 
foundation is the unity of all concrete being. Thus it 
assigns to the human mind an equal place among the 
other parts of the universe; it shows that the mind is 
as closely connected with all the other parts of the uni- 
verse as those parts are among themselves; that is to 
say, the mind exists only as a part of the entire uni- 
verse so that its content is only the effect of the other 
parts. Thus our philosophy forms the theoretical ba- 
sis of historical materialism. While the statement 
that "the consciousness of man is determined by his 
social life" could hitherto at best be regarded as a 
generalization of many historical facts and thus 
seemed imperfect and open to criticism, capable of im- 
provement by later discoveries, the same as all other 
scientific theories, henceforth the complete dependence 
of the mind on the rest of the world becomes as im- 



;;■.' INTRODUCTION 

pregnable and immutable a requirement of thought as 
causality. This signifies the thorough refutation of 
the belief in miracles. After having been banished 
long ago from the field of natural science, miracles 
were now banished from the domain of thought. 

The enlightening effect of this proletarian philoso- 
phy consists furthermore in its opposition to all super- 
stition and its demonstration of the senselessness of 
all idol worship. Socialist understanding accomplished 
something which the bourgeois reformers could not 
do, because they were limited to natural science in a 
narrow sense and could not solve the mystery of the 
mind ; for in explaining all the mental, spiritual phenom- 
ena as natural phenomena our proletarian philosophy fur- 
nishes the means for a trenchant critique of Christian 
faith which consists in the belief in a supernatural spirit- 
ual being. In his dialectic discussions of mind and mat- 
ter, finiteness and infinity, god and the world, Dietzgen 
has thoroughly clarified the confused mystery which 
surrounded these conceptions and has definitely re- 
futed all transcendental beliefs. And this critique is 
no less destructive for the bourgeois idols : Freedom, 
Right, Spirit, Force, which are shown to be but fan- 
tastic images of abstract conceptions with a limited 
validity. 

This could be accomplished in no other way than 
by simultaneously determining, in its capacity as a 
theory of understanding, the relation of the world 
around us to the image which our mind forms of it. 
In this respect Dietzgen completed the work begun 
by Hume and Kant. As a theory of understanding, 
his conceptions are not only the philosophical basis of 
historical materialism, but also of all other sciences 
as well. The thorough critique directed by Dietzgen 



INTRODUCTION 33 

against the works of prominent natural scientists, 
shows that he was well aware of the importance of his 
own work. But, as might be expected, the voice of 
a socialist artisan did not penetrate to the lecture hall 
of the academies. It was not until much later that 
similar views appeared among the natural scientists. 
And now at last the most prominent theorists of nat- 
ural science have adopted the view that explaining sig- 
nifies nothing else but simply and completely describ- 
ing the processes of nature. 

By this theory of understanding Dietzgen has made 
it plainly perceptible why the dialectic method is an 
indispensable auxiliary in the quest for an explanation 
of the nature of understanding. The mind is the fac- 
ulty of generalization. It forms out of concrete real- 
ities, which are a continuous and unbounded stream 
in perpetual motion, abstract conceptions that are es- 
sentially rigid, bounded, stable, and unchangeable. 
This gives rise to the contradiction that our concep- 
tions must always adapt themselves to new realities 
without ever fully succeeding; the contradiction that 
they represent the living by what is dead, the infinite 
by what is finite, and that they are themselves finite 
though partaking of the nature of the infinite. This 
contradiction is understood and reconciled by the in- 
sight into the nature of the faculty of understanding, 
which is simultaneously a faculty of combination and of 
distinction, which forms a limited part of the universe 
and yet encompasses everything, and it is furthermore 
solved by the resulting penetration of the nature of 
the world. The world is a unity of the infinitely nu- 
merous multitude of phenomena and comprises with- 
in itself all contradictions, makes them relative and 
equalizes them. Within its circle there are no abso- 



34 I.N PRODUCTION 

lute opposites. The mind merely constructs them, be- 
cause it has not only the faculty of generalization 
but also of distinguishing. The practical solution of 
all contradictions is the revolutionary practice of in- 
finitely progressing science which moulds old concep- 
tions into new ones, rejects some, substitutes others in 
their place, improves, connects and dissects, still striv- 
ing for an always greater unity and an always wider 
differentiation. 

By means of this theory of understanding, dialectic 
materialism also furnishes the means for the solution 
of the riddles of the world (Weltratsel). Not that it 
solves all these riddles; on the contrary, it says ex- 
plicitly that this solution can be but the work of an 
ever advancing scientific research. But it solves them 
in so far as it deprives them of the character of a mys- 
terious enigma and transforms them into a practical 
problem, the solution of which we are approaching 
by an infinite progression. Bourgeois thought cannot 
solve the riddles of the world. A few years after the 
first publication of Dietzgen's work, natural science 
in the person of Du Bois-Reymond acknowledged its 
incapacity by his "Ignorabimus:" "We shall never 
know." Proletarian philosophy, in solving the rid- 
dle of the human mind, gives us the assurance that 
there are no insoluble riddles before us. 

In conclusion, Dietzgen in this work indicates the 
principles of a new ethics. Starting with the under- 
standing that the origin of the ideas of good and bad 
is found in the needs of man, and designating as really 
moral that which is generally useful, he logically dis- 
covers that the essence of modern morality rests in 
its class interests. At the same time, a relative jus- 
tification is accorded to these temporary ethics, since 



INTRODUCTION 35 

they are the necessary products of definite social re- 
quirements. The link between man and nature is 
formed by the process of social production carried on 
for the satisfaction of man's material wants. So long- 
as this link was a fetter, it bound man by a misap- 
prehended supernatural ethics. But once the process 
of social labor is understood, regulated and controlled, 
then this fetter is dropped and the place of ethics is 
taken by a reasonable understanding of the general 
wants. 

The philosophical works of Dietzgen do not seem 
to have, until now, exerted any perceptible influence 
on the socialist movement. While they may have 
found many a silent admirer and contributed much to- 
ward a clearing up of their thoughts, yet the impor- 
tance of his writings for the theory of our movement 
has not been realized. But this is not a matter for 
great surprise. In the first decade after their publi- 
cation, even the economic works of Marx, the value 
of which was much more apparent, were little appre- 
ciated. The movement developed spontaneously, and 
the Marxian theory could exert a useful and determin- 
ing influence only by means of the clear foresight of 
a few leaders. Hence it is no wonder that the philoso- 
phy of the proletariat, which is less easily and direct- 
ly applicable than our economics, did not receive much 
attention. The political maturity of the German 
working class, which was farthest advanced in the 
theories of the international movement, did not de- 
velop to the point of adopting Marxian theses as party 
principles, until after the abolition of the anti-so- 
cialist laws. But even then they were for most of the 
spokesmen of the party rather concise formulations 



36 INTRODUCTION 

of a few practical convictions than the outcome of a 
thorough scientific training and understanding. It 
was no doubt the great expansion of the party and of 
its activity which demanded all their powers for its 
organization and management, that led the younger 
intellectuals of the party to devote themselves to prac- 
tical work and to neglect the theoretical studies. This 
neglect has bitterly avenged itself in the theoretical 
schisms of the subsequent years. 

The decrepit condition of capitalism is now evi- 
denced very plainly by the decay of the bourgeois 
parties, so that the practical work of the socialist 
party is in itself sufficient to attract every one who has 
an independent turn of mind and a capacity for deep 
feeling. But under the present circumstances, such a 
transition was not accompanied by a proletarian 
world-philosophy acquired by painstaking study. In- 
stead of such a philosophy, we are confronted by a 
critique of socialist science from the bourgeois stand- 
point. Marxism is measured by the standard of the 
immature bourgeois theory of understanding, and the 
Neokantians, unconscious of the positive outcome of 
philosophy of the past century, are trying to connect 
socialism with Kantian ethics. Some even speak of 
a reconciliation with Christianity and a renunciation 
of materialism. 

This bourgeois method of thought, which, being 
anti-dialectic and anti-materialistic, is opposed to Marx- 
ism, has acquired some practical importance in the so- 
clialistic movement of countries where by lack of eco- 
nomical development the class-consciousness of the 
workers is hindered by relics of the narrow-minded 
views of the class of little producers — as in France and 
Italy under the name of reformism. In Germany 



INTRODUCTION 37 

where it could not obtain much practical importance 
it presented itself mostly as a theoretical struggle 
against Marxism under the name of revisionism. It 
combines bourgeois philosophy and anti-capitalist dis- 
position and takes the place formerly occupied by an- 
archism, and, like anarchism, it again represents in 
many respects the little bourgeois tendencies in the 
fight against capitalism. Under these circumstances, 
a closer study of Deitzgen's philosophical works be- 
comes a necessity. 

Marx has disclosed the nature of the social process 
of production, and its fundamental significance as a 
lever of social development. But he has not fully 
explained, by what means the. nature of the human 
mind is involved in this material process. Owing to 
the great traditional influence exerted by bourgeois 
thought, this weak spot in Marxism is one of the main 
reasons for the incomplete and erroneous understand- 
ing of Marxian theories. This shortcoming of Marxism 
is cured by Dietzgen, who made the nature of the mind 
the special object of his investigations. For this reason, 
a thorough study of Dietzgen's philosophical writings is 
an important and indispensable auxiliary for the under- 
standing of the fundamental works of Marx and En- 
gels. Dietzgen's work demonstrates that the proleta- 
riat has a mighty weapon not only in proletarian 
economics, but also in proletarian philosophy. Let us 
learn to wield these weapons ! 

ANTON PANNEKOEK. 
Leyden, Holland, December, 1902. 



The Nature of Human Brain Work 

A Renewed Critique of Pure and 
Practical Reason 

BY A MANUAL WORKER 
Translated by Ernest Untermann 



THE NATURE OF HUMAN 
BRAIN WORK 

PREFACE 

It may not be amiss here to say a few words to the 
kind reader and the unkind critic in regard to the per- 
sonal relation of the author to the present work. The 
first objection which I anticipate will be aimed at my 
lack of scientific learning which is shown indirectly 
rather, between the lines, than in the work itself. 
"How dare you," I ask myself, "come before the pub- 
lic with your statements on a subject, which has been 
treated by such heroes of science as Aristotle, Kant, 
Fichte, Hegel, etc., without being thoroughly familiar 
with all the works of your famous predecessors?" 

At best, will you not merely repeat what has long 
since been accomplished? 

In reply, I wish to say that the seeds sown by 
philosophy in the soil of science have long since blos- 
somed and borne fruit. The product of history devel- 
ops historically, grows and passes away, in order to 
live eternally in another form. The original deed, the 
original work, is fertile only in the contact with the 
conditions and relations of the time in which it is born. 
But it finally becomes an empty shell, when it has 
yielded its kernel to history. Whatever of a positive 
nature was produced by the science of the past, lives 

41 



42 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

no longer in the words of the author, but has become 
more than spirit, has become flesh and blood in pres- 
ent science. In order, e. g., to know the products of 
physics and produce something new in its field, it is 
not necessary to first study the history of this science, 
nor derive the hitherto discovered laws from their 
fundamental source. On the contrary, historical re- 
search might only be an obstacle to the solution of a 
definite physical problem, for concentrated strength 
will naturally accomplish more than divided strength. 
In this sense, I consider my lack of other knowledge 
an advantage, because I am thus enabled to devote my- 
self so much more intensely to my special object. I 
have striven hard to study this object and to learn 
everything which is known about it in my time. The 
history of philosophy has in a certain sense been re- 
peated in the development of my individuality, since 
I speculated from my earliest youth on the means of 
satisfying my longing for a consistent and systematic 
conception of the world, and I believe I have finally 
found this satisfaction in the inductive understanding 
of the human faculty of thought. 

Note that it is not the faculty of thought in its va- 
rious manifestations, not the different forms of it, but 
its general form, its general nature, that satisfied me 
and that I propose to discuss. My object is then very 
plain and circumscribed, indeed it is so simple, that 
I had difficulties in showing its nature from different 
points of view and was compelled to resort to numerous 
repetitions. At the same time, the question concern- 
ing the nature of the mind is a popular one, which is 
not limited to professional philosophy, but concerns 
all sciences. And whatever the history of science has 
contributed towards the solution of this question, must 



PREFACE "43 

be generally alive in the scientific conceptions of the 
present. I could well be satisfied with this source. 

I may, then, confess in spite of my authorship, that 
I am not a professor of philosophy, but a mechanic by 
profession. If any one should feel justified in telling 
me: "Shoemaker, stick to your last!" I would reply 
to him with Karl Marx: "Your non plus ultra profes- 
sional wisdom became enormously foolish from the 
moment when the watchmaker Watt invented the 
steam engine, the barber Arkwright the loom, the jew- 
eler Fulton the steamship." Without classing myself 
among these great men, I can strive to emulate them. 
Besides, the nature of my object is especially pertinent 
to the class, a member of which I have the pleasure, 
if not the honor, of being. 

I treat in this work of the faculty of thought as 
the organ of the general. The oppressed fourth es- 
tate, the working class, is the true exponent of this or- 
gan, the ruling classes being prevented by their spe- 
cial class interests from recognizing the demands of 
general reason. Our first consideration is, of course, 
the relation of our object to human conditions. How- 
ever, so long as conditions are not equalized for men 
in general, but vitiated by class interests, our view of 
things is influenced by these class limitations. A truly 
objective understanding requires a subjective theo- 
retical freedom. Before Copernicus saw the Earth 
was moving and the Sun stationary, he had to place 
himself outside of his terrestrial standpoint. The fac- 
ulty of thought, having all relations for its object, 
must abstract from all of them in order to grasp its 
own real nature. Since we can understand things only 
by means of thought, we must abstract from every- 
thing in order to understand thought in general. This 



44 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

task was too difficult, so long as man was bound to 
some limited class standpoint. Not until historical de- 
velopment has proceeded to the point of striving at 
dissolution of the last society based on a ruling and a 
serving class, can prejudices be overcome to the ex- 
tent of enabling the faculty of understanding to grasp 
the nature of human brain activit)' in the abstract. It 
is only a historical movement aiming at the direct and 
general liberty of the masses, the new era of the fourth 
estate based on much misunderstood premises, which 
can dispense with the spirit cult sufficiently to be en- 
abled to expose the real author of every spook, the 
"pure" mind. The man of the fourth estate represents 
at last the "pure" man. His interests are no longer 
mere class interests, but mass interests, interests of hu- 
manity. This indicates that we are now approaching 
the end of a development in which the interests of the 
mass were dependent on the interests of a ruling class 
and in which humanity made progress not so much in 
spite of as by means of continuous oppression by Jew- 
ish patriarchs, Asiatic conquerors, antique slaveholders, 
feudal barons, guildmasters, modern capitalists and even 
capitalist Caesars. The class conditions of the past were 
inevitable in the general development. Now this devel- 
opment has arrived at a point where the mass becomes 
conscious of itself. Man has hitherto developed by class 
antagonism. By this means he has now arrived at the 
point where he wants to develop himself consciously. 
Class antagonisms were phenomena of humanity. The 
working class strives to abolish class antagonism in order 
that humanity itself may be a truth. 

Just as the Reformation was conditioned on the actual 
environment of the sixteenth century, so, like the discov* 
ery of the electric telegraph, the research of the theory 



45 



of human understanding is based on the actual conditions 
of the nineteenth century. To this extent the contents 
of this little work are not an individual, but a historical 
product. In writing it, I feel myself, if I may use 
this mystic phrase, as a mere organ of the idea. Only 
the form of presenting the subject is mine, and I beg 
the kind reader to judge it leniently. I ask that the 
reader may direct his or her silent or loud objections, not 
against the form, but against the substance of my re- 
marks, not to cling to the letter, but to understand the 
spirit of my words. 

If I should not succeed in developing the idea, and if 

my voice should thus be drowned in the hubbub of 

our overstocked book market, I am nevertheless certain 

that the cause itself will find a more talented champion. 

Joseph Dietzgen, Tanner. 

Siegburg, May 15 ; 1869. 



THE NATURE OF HUMAN 
BRAIN WORK 



INTRODUCTION 

Systematization is the essence and the general ex- 
pression of the aggregate activity of science. Science 
seeks to classify and systematize the objects of the world 
for the understanding of our brain. The scientific under- 
standing of a certain language, e. g., requires an orderly 
arrangement of that language in general categories and 
rules. The science of agriculture does not simply wish 
to produce a good crop of potatoes, but to find a system 
for the methods of cultivation and thus to furnish the 
knowledge by which success in cultivation can be de- 
termined beforehand. The practical result of all theory 
is to acquaint us with the system and method of its prac- 
tice and thus to enable us to act in this world with a 
reasonable certainty of success. Experience is, of course, 
an indispensable condition for this purpose ; but it alone 
is not sufficient. Only by means of empirically developed 
theories, by science, do we overcome the play of acci- 
dent. Science gives us the conscious domination over 
things and unconditional security in handling them. 

No one individual can know everything. The capacity 
of the individual brain is no more adequate for the 

47 



48 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

knowledge of everything that is necessary than the skill 
and strength of the individual's hands are sufficient to pro- 
duce all he needs. Faith is indispensable to man, but 
only faith in that which others know, not in what they 
believe. Science is as much a social matter as material 
production. "One for all and all for one." 

But just as there are some wants of the body 
which every one has to satisfy by himself, so every 
one has to know certain scientific facts which are not 
the prerogative of any special science. 

This is true of the faculty of human understanding. 
The knowledge and study of this theory cannot be 
left to any particular guild. Lassalle justly says: 
"Thinking itself has become a special trade in these 
days of division of labor, and it has fallen into the 
worst hands, those of our newspaper writers." He 
thus urges us not to acquiesce in this appropriation 
any longer, not to submit any more to the harangues 
of public opinion, but to resume thinking for our- 
selves. We may leave certain objects of scientific re- 
search to professionals, but general thought is a pub- 
lic matter which every one should be required to at- 
tend to himself. 

If we could place this general work of thinking 
on a scientific basis, if we could find a theory of gen- 
eral thought, if we were able to discover the means 
by which reason arrives at understanding, if we could 
develop a method by which truth is produced scien- 
tifically, then we should acquire for science in general 
and for our individual faculty of judgment the same 
certainty of success which we already possess in spe- 
cial fields of science. 

Kant says : "If it is not possible to harmonize the 



INTRODUCTION 43 

various co-operators on the question of the means by 
which their common aim is to be accomplished, then 
we may safely infer that such a study is not yet on 
the secure road of science, but will continue to grope 
in the rlark." 

Now, if we take a look at the sciences, we find 
that there are many, especially among the natural 
sciences, which fulfill the requirements of Kant, agree- 
ing unanimously and consciously on certain empirical 
knowledge and building further understanding on 
that. "There we know," as Liebig says, "what is to 
be called a certain fact, a conclusion, a rule, a law. 
We have touchstones for all this, and every one 
makes use of them before making known the fruits of 
his labors. The attempt to maintain any proposition 
by lawyer's tricks, or the intention to make others be- 
lieve anything that cannot be proven, are immediately 
wrecked by the ethics of science." 

Not so in other fields, where concrete and material 
things are left behind and abstract, so-called philoso- 
phical, matters are taken up, as, for instance, questions 
of general conceptions of the world and of life, of be- 
ginning and end, of the semblance and the essence of 
things, of cause and effect, of matter and force, of 
might and right, of wisdom of life, of morality, relig- 
ion, and politics. Here we find, instead of irrefutable 
proofs, mere "lawyer's tricks," an absence of reliable 
knowledge, a mere groping amid contradictory opin- 
ions. 

And it is precisely the prominent authorities of 
natural science who show by their disagreements on 
such matters that they are mere tyros in philosophy. 
It follows, then, that the socalled ethics of science, the 



50 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

touchstones of which the boast is made that they 
never fail in determining what is knowledge and what 
is mere conjecture, are based on a purely instinctive 
practice, not on a conscious theory of understanding. 
Although our time excels in diligent scientific re- 
search, yet the numerous differences among scientists 
show that they are not capable of using their knowl- 
edge with a predetermined certainty of success. Other- 
wise, how could misunderstandings arise? Whoever 
understands understanding, cannot misunderstand. It 
is only the absolute accuracy of astronomical compu- 
tations which entitles astronomy to the name of a 
science. A man who can figure is at least enabled 
to test whether his computation is right or wrong. In 
the same way, the general understanding of the pro- 
cess of thought must furnish us with the touchstone 
by which we can distinguish between understanding 
and misunderstanding, knowledge and conjecture, 
truth and error, by general and irrefutable rules. Er- 
ring is human, but not scientific. Science being a hu- 
man matter, errors may exist eternally, but the under- 
standing of the process of thought will enable us quite 
as well to prevent errors from being offered and ac- 
cepted as scientific truths as an understanding of 
mathematics enables us to eliminate errors from our 
computations. 

It sounds paradoxical and yet it is true : Whoever 
know r s the general rule by which error may be dis- 
tinguished from truth, and knows it as well as the 
rule in grammar by which a noun is distinguished 
from a verb, will be able to distinguish in both cases 
with equal certainty. Scientists as well as scribes 
have ever embarrassed one another by the question: 



INTRODUCTION 51 

What is truth? This question has been an essential 
object of philosophy for thousands of years. This 
question, like philosophy itself, is finally settled by 
the understanding of the faculty of human thought. 
In other words, the question of what constitutes truth 
is identical with the question of the distinction be- 
tween truth and error. Philosophy is the science 
which has been engaged in solving this riddle, and the 
final solution of the riddle by the clear understanding 
of the process of thought also solves the question of 
the nature of philosophy. Hence a short glance at 
the nature and development of philosophy may well 
serve as an introduction to our study. 

As the word philosophy is connected with various 
meanings, I state at the outset that I am referring 
only to socalled speculative philosophy. I dispense 
with frequent quotations and notes of the sources of 
my knowledge, as anything that I may say in this 
respect is so well established that we can afford to dis- 
card all scientific by-work. 

If we apply the above-named test of Kant to specu- 
lative philosophy it appears to be more the playground 
of different opinions than of science. The philoso- 
phical celebrities and classic authorities are not even 
in accord on the question : What is philosophy and 
what is its aim? For this reason, and in order not to 
increase the difference by adding my own opinion, I 
regard everything as philosophy that calls itself by 
that name, and we select from the voluminous litera- 
ture of philosophy that which is common and general 
in all philosophers, without taking any notice of their 
special peculiarities. 

By this empirical method we find fiist of all that 



52 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

philosophy is originally not a specialized science 
working with other sciences, but a generic name for 
all knowledge, the essence of all science, just as art is 
the essence of the various arts. Whoever made 
knowledge, whoever made brain work his essential 
occupation, every thinker without regard to the con- 
tents of his thoughts, was originally a philosopher. 

But when, with the progressive increase of human 
knowledge, the various departments detached them- 
selves from the mother of all wisdom, especially since 
the origin of natural sciences, philosophy became 
known, not so much by its content as by its form. All 
other sciences are distinguished by their various ob- 
jects, while philosophy is marked by its own method. 
Of course, it also has its object and purpose. It de- 
sires to understand the universal whole, the cosmos. 
But it is not this object, this aim, by which philoso- 
phy is characterized ; it is rather the manner in which 
this object is accomplished. 

All other sciences occupy themselves with special 
things, and if they consider the universe at all, they 
do so only in its bearing on the special objects of their 
study, the parts of which the universe is composed. 
Alexander von Humboldt says in his introduction to 
his '"Cosmos" that he is limiting himself to an empiri- 
cal consideration, to a physical research, which seeks 
to elucidate the uniformity and unity by means of 
the great variety. And all inductive sciences arrive 
at general conclusions and conceptions only by way 
of their occupation with special and concrete things. 
For this reason they claim that their conclusions are 
based on facts. 

Speculative philosophy proceeds by the opposite 



INTRODUCTION 53 

method. Thought, the object of its study, may be 
some special question, yet it does not follow this up 
in the concrete. It rejects as fallacious the evidence 
of the senses, the physical experience gained by means 
of the eye and ear, hand and brain, and limits itself to 
"pure" and absolutely abstract thought, in order to 
understand thus by the unit of human reason the mul- 
tiplicity of the universe. In seeking for an answer to 
the question : What is philosophy ? which question 
we are specially discussing just now, speculative 
philosophy would not start out from its actual mate- 
rial form, from its wooden and pigskin volumes, from 
its great and small essays, in order to arrive at a con- 
ception of its object. On the contrary, the speculative 
philosopher turns to introspection and looks in the 
depths of his own mind for the true concept of phi- 
losophy. And by this standard he separates the im- 
pression of his senses into true or erroneous. This 
speculative method has hardly ever dealt in tangible 
things, unless we recognize this philosophical method 
in every unscientific concept of nature which popu- 
lated the world with spooks. The rudiments of scien- 
tific speculation occasionally dealt with the course of 
the sun and the globe. But since inductive astronomy 
cultivates these fields with greater success, speculative 
philosophy limits itself entirely to abstract discus- 
sions. And in this line of research as well as in all 
others it is characterized by the production of its re- 
sults out of the idea or the concept. 

For empirical science, for the inductive method, 
the multiplicity of experiences is the first basis, and 
thought the second. Speculative philosophy, on the 
other hand, seeks to arrive at scientific truth without 



54 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

the help of experience. It rejects the socalled tran- 
sient facts as a foundation of philosophical understand- 
ing-, and declares that it should be absolute, exalted 
above time and space. Speculative philosophy does 
not wish to be scientific physics, but metaphysics. It 
regards it as its task to find by "pure'' reason, and 
without the assistance of experience, a system, a logic, 
or a theory of science, by which everything worth 
knowing is supposed to be reeled off logically and sys- 
tematically, in about the same way in which we de- 
rive grammatically the various forms of a word from 
its root. But the physical sciences operate on the 
assumption that our faculty of understanding, to use 
a familiar illustration, resembles a piece of soft wax 
which receives impressions from outside, or a clean 
slate on which experience writes its lines. Specula- 
tive philosophy, on the other hand, assumes that cer- 
tain ideas are innate and may be dipped and produced 
from the depths of the mind by means of thought. 

The difference between speculative and inductive 
science is that between fantasy and sound common 
sense. The latter produces its ideas by means of the 
outer world, by the help of experience, while fantasy 
gets its product from the depth of the mind, out of 
itself. But this method of production is only seeming- 
ly one-sided. A thinker can no more think trans- 
cendental thoughts which are beyond the reach of ex- 
perience, than a painter can invent transcendental 
pictures, transcendental forms. Just as fantasy cre- 
ates angels by a combination of man and bird, or mer- 
maids by a composition of woman and fish, so all other 
products of fantasy, though seemingly derived out of 
itself, are in fact only arbitrarily arranged impressions 



INTRODUCTION 55 

of the outer world. Reason operates with numbers 
and orders, time and measures, and other means of 
experience, while fantasy reproduces the experiences 
without regard to law and in an arbitrary form. 

The longing for knowledge has been the cause of 
speculative attempts to explain the phenomena of 
life and nature at a time when lack of experience and 
observation made inductive understanding impossi- 
ble. Experience was then supplemented by specula- 
tion. In later times, when experience had grown, 
previous speculation was generally recognized as er- 
roneous. But it nevertheless required thousands of 
years of repeated disappointments on one side and 
numerous brilliant successes of the inductive method 
on the other, before these speculative hobbies came 
into disfavor. 

Fantasy has certainly a positive power, and 
speculative intuition, derived from analogy, very often 
precedes empirical and inductive understanding. But 
we must remain aware of the fact that so much is 
assumption and so much actual scientific knowledge. 
Conscious intuition stimulates scientific research, 
while pseudo-science closes the door to inductive re- 
search. The acquisition of the clear understanding of 
the distinction between speculation and knowledge is 
a historical process, the beginning - and end of which 
coincides with the beginning and end of speculative 
philosophy. 

In ancient times, common sense operated in com- 
mon with fantasy, the inductive with the speculative 
method. The discussion of their differences begins 
only with the understanding of the numerous disap- 
pointments caused by the still inexperienced judgment 



5G THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

which have prevented an unobstructed view of the ques- 
tion up to modern times. But instead of attributing 
these disappointments to lack of understanding, they 
were charged to the account of the imperfection of 
the senses. The senses were called impostors and ma- 
terial phenomena untrue images. Who has not heard 
the lament about the unreliability of the senses? The 
misunderstanding of nature and of its phenomena led 
to a serious rupture with sense perceptions. The 
philosophers had deceived themselves and thought they 
had been deceived by the senses. In their anger they 
turned disdainfully away from the world of sensa- 
tions. With the same uncritical faith with which the 
semblance had hitherto been accepted as truth, now 
uncritical doubt rejected the truth of sensations al- 
together. Research abandoned nature and experience, 
and began the work of speculative philosophy by 
"pure" thought. 

But no! Science did not permit itself to be entirely 
led astray from the path of common sense, from the 
way of truth of sense perceptions. Natural science 
soon stepped into the breach, and its brilliant suc- 
cesses gained for the inductive method the conscious- 
ness of its fertility, while on the other hand philoso- 
phy searched for a system by which all the great gen- 
eral truths might be opened up without specialized 
study, without sense perception and observation, by 
mere reason alone. 

Now we have a more than sufficient quantity of 
such speculative systems. If we measure them with 
the aforementioned standard of unanimousness, we 
find that philosophy agrees only on its disagreements. 
In consequence, the history of speculative philosophy, 



INTRODUCTION 57 

unlike the history of other sciences, consists less of a 
gradual accumulation of knowledge, than of a series 
of unsuccessful attempts to solve the general riddles 
of nature and life by "pure" thought, without the help 
of the objects and experience of the outer world. The 
most daring attempt in this line, the most artificial 
structure of thought, was completed by Hegel in the 
beginning of the nineteenth century. To use a com- 
mon expression, he became as famous in the world of 
science as Napoleon I did in the world of politics. 
But Hegelian philosophy has not stood the test of 
time. Haym, in his work entitled "Hegel and His 
Time," says of Hegelian philosophy that "it was 
pushed aside by the progress of the world and by 
living history."* 

The outcome of philosophy up to that time, then, 
was a declaration of its own impotence. Nevertheless, 
we do not underestimate the fact that a work occupy- 
ing the best brains for thousands of years surely con- 
tained some positive element. And in fact, specula- 
tive philosophy has a history, which is not merely a 
series of unsuccessful attempts, but also a living devel- 
opment. However, it is less the object of its study, 
less the logical world system, which developed, than its 
method. 

Every positive science has a material object, a 
beginning in the outer world, a premise on which its 
understanding is based. Every empirical science has 
for its fundament some material of the senses, some 
given object, on which its understanding is depend- 
ent, and thus it becomes "impure." Speculative phi- 
losophy seeks a "pure, absolute," understanding. It 
wishes to understand by "pure" reason, without any 



58 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

material, without any experience. It takes its de- 
parture from the enthusiastic conviction of the supe- 
riority of understanding and knowledge over expe- 
rience gained by sense perceptions. For this reason 
it wishes to leave experience entirely aside in favor of 
absolutely "pure" understanding. Its object is truth; 
not concrete truth, not the truth of this or that thing, 
but truth in general, truth "in itself." The speculative 
systems seek after an absolute beginning, an indubita- 
bly self-supporting starting point, from which they 
may determine the absolutely indubitable. The spec- 
ulative systems are thus by their own mentality per- 
fectly complete and selfsufficient systems. Every 
speculative system found its end in the subsequent 
knowledge that its totality, its selfsufficiency, its 
absoluteness, was imaginary, that it could be de- 
termined empirically and externally like all other 
knowledge, that it was not a philosophical sys- 
tem, but a relative and empirical attempt at under- 
standing. Speculation finally dissolved into the knowl- 
edge that understanding is by its very nature "im- 
pure," that the organ of philosophy, the faculty of un- 
derstanding cannot begin its studies without a given 
point of departure, that science is not absolutely su- 
perior to experience, but only so far as it can organize 
numerous experiences. It followed from these prem- 
ises that the object of philosophy can be a general and 
objective understanding, or "truth in itself," only in 
so far as understanding or truth in general can be' 
derived from given concrete objects. In plain words, 
speculative philosophy was reduced to the unphilo- 
sophical science of the empirical faculty of under- 
standing, to the critique of reason. 



INTRODUCTION 59 

Modern conscious speculation takes its departure 
from the experienced difference between semblance 
and truth. It denies all sense phenomena in 
order to find truth by thinking, without being de- 
ceived by any semblance. The subsequent philoso- 
phers, however, found every time that the truths of 
their predecessors, gained by this method, were not 
what they pretended to be, but that their positive rev 
suit consisted simply in having advanced the science 
of the thought process to a certain extent. By deny- 
ing the actuality of the senses, by endeavoring to sep- 
arate thought from all sense perceptions, by isolating 
it, so to say, from its sensory cover, speculative philoso- 
phy, more than any other science,, laid bare the structure 
of the mind. The more this philosophy advanced in time, 
the more it developed in its historical course, the more 
classically and strikingly did this kernel of its work 
spring into view. After the repeated creation of giant 
fantasmagorias, it found its solution in the positive 
knowledge that socalled pure philosophical thought, 
abstracting from all concrete contents, is nothing but 
thoughtless thought, thought without any real object 
back of it, and produces mere fantasmagorias. This 
process of speculative deception and scientific ex- 
posure was continued up to recent times. Finally the 
solution of the main question, and the solution of spec- 
ulation, was introduced with the following words of 
Feuerbach: "My philosophy is no philosophy." 

The long story of speculative work was finally re- 
duced to the understanding of reason, of the intel- 
lect, the mind, to the exposure of those mysterious 
operations which we call thinking. 

The secret of the processes by which the truths of 



60 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

understanding are produced, the ignorance of the fact 
that every thought requires an object, a premise, was 
the cause of the idle speculative wanderings which we find 
registered in the history of philosophy. The same 
secret is today the cause of those numerous specula- 
tive mistakes which we observe in passing over the 
words and works of naturalists. Their knowledge and 
understanding is far developed, but only so far as it 
refers to tangible objects. The moment they touch 
upon abstract discussions, they offer "lawyers' proofs" 
in place of "objective facts." For although they know 
intuitively and in a concrete case that this is a truth, 
that a conclusion, and that a rule, they do not apply 
this knowledge in general with consciousness and 
theoretical consistency. The successes of natural 
science have taught them to operate the instrument 
of thought, the mind, instinctively. But they lack the 
systematic understanding which operates with con- 
scious and predetermined certainty. They ignore the 
outcome of speculative philosophy. 

It will be our task to set forth in a short summary 
what speculative philosophy has unconsciously pro- 
duced of a positive nature by a tedious process, in other 
words, to explain the general nature of the thought 
process. We shall see that the understanding of this 
process will furnish us with the means of solving 
scientifically the general riddles of nature and of life. 
And thus we shall learn how that fundamental and. 
systematic world conception is developed which was 
the long coveted goal of speculative philosophy. 



II 

PURE REASON OR THE FACULTY OF THOUGHT IN GENERAL 

When speaking of food in general, we may men- 
tion fruits, cereals, vegetables, meat and bread and clas- 
sify them all, in spite of their difference, under this one 
head. In the same way, we use, in this work, the 
terms reason, consciousness, intellect, knowledge, 
discernment, understanding, as referring to the same 
general thing. For we are discussing the general na- 
ture of the thought process rather than its special 
forms. 

"No intelligent thinker of our day," says a modern 
physiologist, "pretends to look for the seat of the in- 
tellectual powers in the blood, as did the ancient 
Greeks, or in the pineal gland, as was the case in the 
middle ages. Instead we have all become convinced 
that the central nerve system is the organic center of 
the intellectual functions of the brain." Yes, true 
enough, thinking is a function of the brain and nerve 
centre, just as writing is a function of the hand. But 
the study of the anatomy of the hand can no more 
solve the question: What is writing? than the 
physiological study of the brain can bring us nearer 
to the solution of the question: What is thought? 
With the dissecting knife, we may kill, but we cannot 
discover the mind. The understanding that thought 
is a product of the brain takes us closer to the solu- 

61 



62 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

tion of our problem, in as much as it draws it into the 
bright light of reality and out of the domain of fan- 
tasy in which the ghosts dwell. Mind thereby loses 
the character of a transcendental incomprehensible 
being and appears as a bodily function. 

Thinking is a function of the brain just as walking 
is a function of the legs. We perceive thought and 
mind just as clearly with our senses as we do pain 
and other feelings. Thought is felt by us as a sub- 
jective process taking place inside of us. According 
to its contents this process varies every moment and 
with each person, but according to its form it is the 
same everywhere. In other words, in the thought 
process, as in all processes, we make a distinction be- 
tween the special or concrete and the general or ab- 
stract. The general purpose of thought is under- 
standing. We shall see later that the simplest con- 
ception, or any idea for that matter, is of the same 
general nature as the most perfect understanding. 

Thought and understanding cannot be without 
subjective contents any more than without an object 
which suggests individual reflection. Thought is 
work, and like every other work it requires an object 
to which it is applied. The statements : I do, I work, 
I think, must be completed by an answer to the ques- 
tion : What are you doing, working, thinking? 

Every definite idea, all actual thought, is identical 
with its content, but not with its object. My desk 
as a picture in my mind is identical with my idea of 
it. But my desk outside of my brain is a separate 
object and distinct from my idea. The idea is to be 
distinguished from thinking only as a part of the 



PURE REASON 63 

thought process, while the object of my thought exists 
as a separate entity. 

We make a distinction between thinking and be- 
ing. We distinguish between the object of sense per- 
ception and its mental image. Nevertheless the in- 
tangible idea is also material and real. I perceive my 
idea of a desk just as plainly as the desk itself. True, 
if I choose to call only tangible things material, then 
ideas are not material. But in that case the scent of 
a rose and the heat of a stove are not material. It 
would be better to call thoughts sense perceptions. 
But if it is objected that this would be an incorrect 
use of the word, because language distinguishes ma- 
terial and mental things, then we dispense with the 
word material and call thought real. Mind is as real 
as the tangible table, as the visible light, as the audi- 
ble sound. While the idea of these things is different 
from the things themselves, yet it has that in common 
with them that it is as real as they. Mind is not any 
more different from a table, a light, a sound, than 
these things differ among themselves. We do not 
deny that there is a difference. We merely emphasize 
that they have the same general nature in common. 
I hope the reader will not misunderstand me hence- 
forth, when I call the faculty of thought a material 
quality, a phenomenon of sense perception. 

Every perception of the senses is based on some 
object. In order that heat may be real, there must be 
an object, something else which is heated. The active 
cannot exist without the passive. The visible cannot 
exist without the faculty of sight, nor the faculty of 
sight without visible things. So is the faculty of 
thought a phenomenon, but it can never exist in it- 



64 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

self, it must always be based on some sense percep- 
tion. Thought appears, like all other phenomena, in 
connection with an object. The function of the brain 
is no more a "pure" process than the function of the 
eye, the scent of a flower, the heat of a stove, or the 
touch of a table. The fact that a table may be seen, 
heard, or felt, is due as much to its own nature as to 
that of another object with which it enters into some 
relation. 

But while each function is limited by its own sep- 
arate line of objects, while the function of the eye 
serves only for the perception of the visible, the hand 
for the tangible, while walking finds an object in the 
space it crosses, thought, on the other hand, has 
everything for its object. Evetything may be the ob- 
ject of understanding. Thought is not limited to any 
special object. Every phenomenon may be the object 
and the content of thought. More than this, we can 
only perceive anything when it becomes the object of 
our brain activity. Everything is therefore the object 
and content of thought. The faculty of thought may 
be exerted quite generally on all objects. 

We said a moment ago that everything may be 
perceived, but we now modify this to the effect that 
only perceivable things may be perceived. Only .the 
knowable can be the object of knowledge, only the 
thinkable the object of thought. To this extent the 
faculty of thought is limited, for it cannot replace 
reading, hearing, feeling, and all other innumerable 
activities of the world of sensations. We do, indeed, 
perceive all objects, but no object may be exhaustive- 
ly perceived, known, or understood. In other words, 
the objects are not wholly dissolved in the under- 



PURE REASON 65 

standing. Seeing requires something that is visible, 
something which is, therefore, more than seeing. In 
the same way, hearing requires something that can be 
heard, thinking an object that can be thought of, 
something which is more than our thoughts, some- 
thing still outside of our consciousness. We shall 
learn later on how we arrive at the knowledge that 
we see, hear, feel, and think of objects, and not merely 
of subjective impressions. 

By means of thought we become aware of all 
things in a twofold manner, viz., outside in reality 
and inside in thought, in conception. It is easy to 
demonstrate that the things outside are different from 
the things in our thoughts. In their actual form, in 
their real dimensions, they cannot enter into our 
heads. Our brain does not assimilate the things them- 
selves, but only their images, their general outlines. 
The imagined tree is only a general object. The real 
tree is different from any other. And though I may 
have a picture of some special tree in my head, yet the 
real tree is still as different from its conception as the 
Special is different from the general. The infinite va- 
riety of things, the innumerable wealth of their prop- 
erties, has no room in our heads. 

I repeat, then, that we become aware of the outer 
world in a twofold way, viz., in a concrete, tangible, 
manifold form, and in an abstract form, which is 
mental and unitary. To our senses the world appears 
as a variety of forms. Our brains combine them as 
a unit. And what is true of the world, holds good of 
every one of its parts. A sense-perceived unit is a 
nonentity. Even the atom of a drop of water or the 
atom of any chemical element, is divisible, so long as 



66 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

it exists at all, and its parts are different and distinct. 
A is not B. But the concept, the faculty of thought, 
makes of every tangible or sense-perceived part an ab- 
stract whole and conceives of every whole or quantity as 
a part of the abstract world unit. In order to understand 
the things in their entirety, we must take them prac- 
tically and theoretically, with body and mind. With the 
body we can grasp only the bodily, the tangible, with the 
mind only the mental, the thinkable. Things also possess 
mental quality. Mind is material and things are mental. 
Mind and matter are real only in their inter-relations. 

Can we see the things themselves? No, we see 
only the effects of things on our eyes. We do not 
taste the vinegar, but the relation of the vinegar to 
our tongue. The result is the sensation of acidity. 
The vinegar is acid only in relation to our tongue. 
In relation to iron it acts as a solvent. In the cold it 
becomes hard, in the heat liquid. It acts differently 
on different objects with which it enters into relations 
of time and space. Vinegar is a phenomenon, just as 
all things are. But it never appears as Vinegar by it- 
self. It always appears in connection with other phe- 
nomena. Every phenomenon is a product of a sub- 
ject and an object. 

In order that a thought may appear, the brain or 
the faculty of thought is not sufficient in itself. It re- 
quires, besides, an object which suggests the thought. 
From this relative nature of our topic it follows that 
in its treatment we cannot confine ourselves "purely" 
to it. Since reason, or the faculty of thought, never 
appears by itself, but always in connection with other 
things, we are continually compelled to pass from the 



PURE REASON 67 

faculty of thought to other things, which are its ob- 
jects, and to treat of their connections. 

Just as the sight does not see the tree, but only 
that which is visible of the tree, so does the faculty of 
thought assimilate only the perceivable image of an 
object, not the object itself. A thought is a child be- 
gotten by the function of the brain in communion 
with some object. In a thought is crystalized on one 
side the subjective facult}^ of thought, and on the 
other the perceivable nature of an object. Every 
function of the mind presupposes some object by 
which it is caused and the spiritual image of which 
it is. Or vice versa, the spiritual content of the mind 
is derived from some object which has its own exist- 
ence and which is either seen or heard, or smelled, or 
tasted, or felt, in short, experienced. 

Referring back to the statement that seeing is lim- 
ited to the visible qualities of some object, hearing to 
its audible qualities, etc., while the faculty of thought 
has everything for its object, we now understand this 
to mean that all objects have certain innumerable, 
but concrete, qualities which are perceptible by our 
senses, and in addition thereto the general spiritual 
quality of being thought of, understood, in short, of 
being the object of our faculty of thought. 

This mode of classifying all objects applies also to 
the faculty of thought itself. The spirit, or mind, is 
a bodily function connected with the senses which ap- 
pear in various forms. Mind is thought generated at 
different times in different brains by different objects 
through the instrumentality of the senses. We may 
choose this mind as the object of special thought the 
same as all other things. Considered as an object, 



G8 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

mind is a manysided and sense-perceived fact which 
in connection with a special function of the brain gen- 
erates the general concept of "Mind" as the content 
of this special thought process. The object of thought 
is distinguished from its contents in the same way in 
which every object is distinguished from its mental 
image. The different kinds of motion perceived by 
the help of the senses are the object of a certaia 
thought process and supply to it the idea of "motion." 
It is easier to understand that the mental image of 
some object perceived by the senses has a father and 
a mother, being begotten by our faculty of thought 
by means of some sense-perceived object, than it is to 
grasp the existence of that trinity which is born when 
our present thought experiences its own existence and 
thus creates a conception of its own self. This has the 
appearance of moving around in a circle. The object, 
the content and the function of thought apparently 
coincide. Reason deals with itself, considers itself as 
an object and is its own content. But nevertheless the 
distinction between an object and its concept, though 
less evident, is just as actual as in other cases. 
It is only the habit of regarding matter and mind as 
fundamentally different things which conceals this 
truth. The necessity to make a distinction compels 
us everywhere to discriminate between the object of 
sense perception and its mental concept. We are 
forced to do the same in the case of the faculty of 
thought, and thus we find it necessary to give the 
name of "Mind" to this special object of our sense 
perceptions. Such an ambiguity of terms cannot be 
entirely avoided in any science. A reader who does 
not cling to words, but rather seeks to grasp the mean- 



PURE REASON 69 

ing, will easily realize that the difference between 
being and thinking applies also to the faculty of 
thought, that the fact of understanding is different 
from the understanding of understanding. And since 
the understanding of understanding is again another 
fact, it will be permitted to call all spiritual things 
facts or sense perceptions. 

Reason, or the faculty of thought, is therefore not 
a mystical object which produces the individual 
thought. On the contrary, it is a fact that certain in- 
dividual thoughts are the product of perception gained 
in contact with certain objects and that these in con- 
nection with a certain brain operation produce the con- 
cept of reason. Reason as well as all other things of 
which we become aware has a two-fold existence : 
one as a phenomenon or sense-perception, the other as 
a concept. The concept of any thing presupposes a 
certain sense-perception of that thing, and so does the 
concept of reason. Since all men think as a matter of 
fact, every one has himself perceived reason as a part 
of reality, as a phenomenon, sense-perception or fact. 

Our object, reason, by virtue of the fact that it 
partakes of the nature of the senses, has the faculty of 
transforming the speculative method, which tries to 
dip understanding out of the depths of the spirit with- 
out the help of sense-perception, into the inductive 
method, and vice versa of transforming the inductive 
method, which desires to arrive at conclusions, con- 
cepts, or understanding exclusively by means of sense- 
perception, into the speculative method, by virtue of 
its simultaneous spiritual nature. Our problem is to 
analyze the concept of thought, or of the faculty of 



70 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

thought, or of reason, of knowing, of science, by means 
of thought. 

To produce thoughts and to analyze them is the 
same thing inasmuch as both actions are functions of 
the brain. Both have the same nature. But they are 
different to the same extent that instinct differs from 
consciousness. Man does not think originally because 
he wants to, but because he must. Ideas are produced 
instinctively, involuntarily. In order to become fully 
aware of them, to place them within the grasp of 
knowing and willing, we must analyze them. From 
the experience of walking, for instance, we derive the 
idea of walking. To analyze this idea means to solve 
the question, what is walking generally considered, 
what is the general nature of walking? We may an- 
swer: Walking is a rythmical motion from one place 
to another, and thus we raise the instinctive idea to 
the position of a conscious analyzed idea. An object 
is not consciously, theoretically, understood, until it 
has been analyzed. In examining what elements con- 
stitute the concept of walking, we find that the gen- 
eral attribute of that experience which we agree in 
calling "'walking" is a rythmical motion. In actual 
experience steps may be long or short, may be taken 
by two feet or by more, in brief may be varied. But 
as a concept walking is simply a rythmical motion, 
and the analysis of this concept furnishes us with 
the conscious understanding of this fact. The con- 
cept of light existed long before science analyzed it, 
before it was understood that undulations of the 
ether form the elements which constitute the concept 
of light. Instinctive and analytical ideas differ in the 



PURE REASON 71 

same way in which the thoughts of every day life dif- 
fer from the thoughts of science. 

The analysis of any idea and the theoretical analy- 
sis of any object, or of the thing which suggested the 
idea, is one and the same. Every idea corresponds to 
some real object. Ludwig Feuerbach has demon- 
strated that even the concepts of God and immortality 
are reflections of real objects which can be perceived 
by the senses. For the purpose of anaylzing such 
ideas as animal, light, friendship, man, etc., the phe- 
nomena, the objects, such as animals, friendships, 
men," and lights, are analyzed. The object which 
serves for the analysis of the concept "animal" is no 
more any single anrmal, than the object of the concept 
"light" is any single light. These concepts comprise 
classes, things in general, and therefore the question, 
or the analysis, of what constitutes the animal, the 
light, friendship, must not deal with any concrete, but 
with the abstract elements of the whole class. 

The fact that the analysis of a concept and the an- 
alysis of its object appear as two different things is 
due to our faculty of being able to separate things 
into two parts, viz., into a practical, tangible, per- 
ceptible, concrete thing and into a theoretical mental, 
thinkable, general thing. The practical analysis is 
the premise of the theoretical analysis. The individ- 
ually perceptible animals serve us as a basis for the 
analysis of the animal concept, the individually expe- 
rienced friendships as the basis for the analysis of the 
concept of friendship. 

Every idea corresponds to an object which may be 
practically separated into its component parts. To 
analyze a concept is equivalent, therefore, to analyzing 



72 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

a previously experienced object by theoretical means. 
The analysis of a concept consists in the understand- 
ing of the common or general faculties of the concrete 
parts of the analyzed object. That which is common 
to the various modes of walking, the rythmical motion, 
constitutes the concept of walking, that which is 
common to the various manifestations of light consti- 
tutes the concept of light. A chemical factory anal- 
yzes objects for the purpose of obtaining chemicals, 
while science analyzes them for the purpose of ob- 
taining their concepts. 

The special object of our analysis, the faculty of 
thought, is likewise distinguished from its concept. 
But in order to be able to analyze this concept, we 
must analyze the object. It cannot be analyzed 
chemically, for not everything is a matter of chem- 
istry, but it may be analyzed theoretically or scien- 
tifically. As we have already stated, the science of 
understanding deals with all objects. But all objects 
which this science may wish to analyze theoretically, 
must first be handled practically. According to their 
special natures, they must either be handled in va- 
rious ways, or carefully inspected, or scrutinized by 
intent listening, in short they must be thoroughly ex- 
perienced in some way. 

It is a fact of experience that men think. The 
object or suggestion is furnished by facts, and we 
then derive the concept instinctively. Thus, to anal- 
yze the faculty of thought means to find that which 
is common or general to the various personal and 
temporary processes of thought. In order to follow 
this study by the methods of natural science, we re- 
quire neither physical instruments nor chemical re- 



PURE REASON 73 

agents. The sense perception which is indispensable 
for every scientific understanding, is so to say present 
in this case a priori, without further experience. Every 
one possesses the object of our study, the fact of thought 
faculty and its experience, in the memories of himself 
or herself. 

We have seen that thought like any other activity 
as well as its scientific analysis is everywhere devel- 
oping the general or abstract out of particular and 
concrete sense perceptions. We now express this in 
the following words : The common feature of all sep- 
arate thought-processes consists in their seeking the 
general character or unity which is common to all 
objects experienced in their manifold variety by sense 
perceptions. The general element which is common 
to the different animals, or to the different manifes- 
tations of light, is that which constitutes the general 
animal or light concept. The general is the nature 
of all concepts, of all understanding, all science, all 
thought processes. Thus we arrive at the'*- under- 
standing that the analysis of the faculty of thought 
reveals its nature of finding that which is general and 
common to concrete and distinct things. The eye 
studies the visible, the ear the audible, and our brain 
that which is generally conceivable. 

We have seen that thought like any other activity 
requires an object; that it is unlimited in the choice 
of its objects, because all things may become the ob- 
jects of thought; that these objects are perceived in 
manifold forms by various senses; and that they are 
transformed into simple ideas by extricating that 
which they possess in common, which is similar, 
which is general in them. If we apply this expe- 



74 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

rienced understanding of the general method of 
thought processes to our special object, the faculty of 
thought, we realize that we have thus solved our prob- 
lem, because all we were looking for was the general 
method of the thought process. 

// the development of the general out of the concrete 
constitutes the general method by which reason arrives at 
understanding, then we have fully grasped reason as the 
faculty of deriving the general out of the concrete. 

Thinking is a physical process and it cannot exist 
or produce anything without materials any more than 
any other process of labor. My thought requires 
some material which can be thought of. This mate- 
rial is furnished by the phenomena of nature and life. 
These are the concrete things. In claiming that the 
universe, or all things, may be the object of thought, 
we simply mean that the materials of the thought 
process, the objects of the mind, are infinite in quan- 
tity and quality. The materials which the universe 
furnishes for our thought are as infinite as space, as 
eternal as time, and as absolutely manifold as the na- 
ture of these two forms of being. The faculty of 
thought is a universal faculty in so far as it enters 
into relations with all things, all substances, all phe- 
nomena, and thus generates thought. But it is not 
absolute, since it requires for its existence and action 
the previous presence of matter. Matter is the 
boundary, beyond which the mind cannot pass. Mat- 
ter furnishes the background for the illumination of 
the mind, but is not consumed in this illumination. 
Mind is a product of matter, but matter is more than 
a product of mind, being perceived also through the 
five senses and thus brought to our notice. We call 



PURE REASON 75 

real, objective products, or "things themselves" only 
such products as are revealed to us simultaneously by 
the senses and the mind. 

Reason is a real thing only in so far as it is per- 
ceived by the senses. The perceptible actions of rea- 
son are revealed in the brain of man as well as in the 
world outside of it. For are not the effects tangible 
by which reason transforms nature and life? We 
see the successes of science with our eyes and grasp 
them with our hands. It is true that science or reason 
cannot produce such material effects out of them- 
selves. The world of sense perceptions, the objects 
outside of the human brain, must be given. But 
what thing is there that has any effects "in itself?" 
In order that light may shine, that the sun may warm, 
and revolve in its course, there must be space and 
other things which may be lighted and warmed and 
passed. In order that my table may have color, there 
must be light and eyes. And everything else which 
my table is besides, it can be only in contact with 
other things. Its being is just as manifold as those 
various contacts or relations. In short, the world 
consists only in its interrelations. Any thing that is 
torn out of its relations with the world ceases to ex- 
ist. A thing is anything "in itself" only because it is 
something for other things, by acting or appearing in 
connection with something else. 

If we wish to regard the world in the light of the 
"thing itself," we shall easily see that the world "it- 
self" and the world as it appears, the world of phe- 
nomena, differ only in the same way in which the 
whole differs from its component parts. The world 
"itself ' is nothing else but the sum total of its phe- 



76 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

nomena. The same holds good of that part of the 
world phenomena which we call reason, spirit, facul- 
ty of thought. Although we distinguish between the 
faculty of thought and its phenomena or manifesta- 
tions, yet the faculty of thought "itself," or "pure" 
reason, exists in reality only in the sum total of its 
manifestations. Seeing is the physical existence of 
the faculty of sight. We possess the whole only by 
means of its parts, and we can possess reason,- like all 
other things, only by the help of its effects, by its va- 
rious thoughts. But we repeat that reason does not 
precede thought in the order of time. On the con- 
trary thoughts generated by perceptible objects serve 
as a basis for the development of the concept of the 
faculty of thought. Just as the understanding of the 
world movements has taught us that the sun is not 
revolving around the earth, so the understanding of 
the thought process tells us that it is not the faculty 
of thought which creates thought, but vice versa, 
that the concept of this faculty is created out of a 
series of concrete thoughts. Hence the faculty of thought 
practically exists only as the sum total of our 
thoughts, just as the faculty of sight exists only 
through the sum of the things that we see. 

These thoughts, this practical reason, serve as the 
material out of which our brain manufactures the 
concept of "pure" reason. Reason is necessarily im- 
pure in practice, which means that it must connect 
itself with some object. Pure reason, or abstract 
reason without any special content, cannot be any- 
thing else but the general characteristic of all con- 
crete reasoning processes. We possess this general 
nature of reason in two ways : In an impure state, 



PURE REASON 77 

that is as practical and concrete phenomenon, con- 
sisting of the sum of our real perceptions, and in a 
pure state, that is theoretically or abstractly, in the 
concept. The phenomenon of reason is distinguished 
from reason "itself" just as the real animals are dis- 
tinguished from the concept of the animal. 

Every actual reasoning process is based on some 
real object which has many qualities like all things 
in nature. The faculty of thought extracts from this 
many-sided object those properties which are general 
or common with it. A mouse and an elephant, as the 
objects of our reasoning activity, lose their differ- 
ences in the general animal concept. Such a concept 
combines many things under one uniform point of 
view, it develops one general idea out of many con- 
crete things. Since understanding is the general or 
common quality of all reasoning processes, it follows 
that reason in general, or the general nature of the 
reasoning process, consists in abstracting the gen- 
eral ideal character from any concrete thing per- 
ceptible by the help of the senses. 

Reason being unable to exist without some objects 
outside of itself, it is understood that we can perceive 
"pure" reason, or reason "itself," only by its practi- 
cal manifestations. We cannot find reason without 
objects outside of it with which it comes in contact 
and produces thought, any more than we can find 
any eyes without light. And the manifestations of 
reason are as varied as the objects which supply its 
material. It is plain, then, that reason has no sep- 
arate existence "in itself," but that on the contrary 
the concept of reason is formed out of the material 
supplied by the senses. 



78 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

Mental processes appear only in connection with 
perceptible phenomena. These processes are them- 
selves phenomena of sense perception which, in con- 
nection with a brain process, produce the concept of 
the faculty of thought "itself." If we analyze this 
concept, we find that "pure" reason consists in the 
activity of producing general ideas out of concrete 
materials, which include so-called immaterial 
thoughts. In other words, reason may be character- 
ized as an activity which seeks for unity in every mul- 
tiplicity and equalizes all contrasts whether it deals 
with the many different sides and parts of one or of 
more objects. All these different statements describe 
the same thing in different words, so that the reader 
may not cling to the empty word, but grasp the living 
concept, the manifold object, in its general nature. 

Reason, we said, exists in a "pure" state as the de- 
velopment of the general out of the special, of the 
abstract out of concrete sense perceptions. This is 
the whole content of pure reason, of scientific under- 
standing, of consciousness. And by the terms "pure" 
and "whole" we simply indicate that we mean the gen- 
eral content of the various thought processes, the 
general form of reason. Apart from this general ab- 
stract form, reason, like all other things, has also its 
concrete, special, sense form which we perceive di- 
rectly through our experience. Hence our entire pro- 
cess of consciousness consists in the experience of. 
the senses, that is in the physical process, and its un- 
destanding. Understanding is the general reflection 
of any object. 

Consciousness, as the Latin root of the word indicates, 
is the knowledge of being in existence. It is a form, or a 



PURE REASON 79 

quality, of existence which differs from other forms of 
being in that it is aware of its existence. Quality cannot 
be explained, but must be experienced. We know by 
experience that consciousness includes along with the 
knowledge of being in existence the difference and con- 
tradiction between subject and object, thinking and being, 
between form and content, between phenomenon and es- 
sential thing, between attribute and substance, between the 
general and the concrete. This innate contradiction ex- 
plains the various terms applied to consciousness, such as 
the organ of abstraction, the faculty of generaliza- 
tion or unification, or in contradistinction thereto the 
faculty of differentiation. For consciousness general- 
izes differences and differentiates generalities. Con- 
tradiction is innate in consciousness, and its nature is 
so contradictory that it is at the same time a differ- 
tiating, a generalizing, and an understanding nature. 
Consciousness generalizes contradiction. It recognizes 
that all nature, all being, lives in contradictions, that 
everything is what it is only in co-operation with its 
opposite. Just as visible things are not visible with- 
out the faculty of sight, and vice versa the faculty of 
sight cannot see anything but what is visible, so con- 
tradiction must be recognized as something general 
which pervades all thought and being. The science 
of understanding, by generalizing contradiction, 
solves all concrete contradictions. 



Ill 



THE NATURE OF THINGS 



In so far as the faculty of understanding is a 
physical object, the knowledge of its nature is a mat- 
ter of physical science. But in so far as we under- 
stand all things by the help of this faculty, the science 
of understanding becomes metaphysics. Inasmuch 
as the scientific analysis of reason reverses the cur- 
rent conception of its nature, this specific understand- 
ing necessarily reverses our entire world philosophy. 
With the understanding of the nature of reason, we 
arrive at the long sought understanding of the "na- 
ture of things." 

We wish to know, understand, conceive, recognize 
all things in their very nature, not in their outward 
appearance. Science seeks to understand the nature 
of things, or their true essence, by means of their 
manifestations. Every thing has its own special na- 
ture, and this nature is not seen, or felt, or heard, but 
solely perceived by the faculty of thought. This fac- 
ulty explores the nature of all things just as the eye 
explores all that is visible in things. Just as the na- 
ture of sight is understood by the theory of vision, 
so the nature of things in general is understood by the 
theory of understanding. 

It is true that it sounds contradictory to say that 
the nature of a thing does not appear to the eye, but 



THE NATURE OF THINGS 81 

to the faculty of thought, and at the same time to 
imply that the opposite of appearance, nature, should 
appear. But we here refer to the nature of a thing as 
a phenomenon in the same way in which we referred 
to the mind as a perception of the senses, and we 
shall demonstrate further on that every being is a 
phenomenon, and every phenomenon is more or less 
of an essential thing. 

We have seen that the faculty of thought requires 
for its vital activity an object, or raw material. The 
effect of reasoning is seen in science, no matter 
whether we understand the term science in its nar- 
row classical sense or in its broadest meaning of any 
kind of knowledge. The phenomena of sense percep- 
tion constitute the general object or material of 
science. Sense perceptions arise from infinite circu- 
lation of matter. The universe and all things in it 
consist of transformations of matter which take 
place simultaneously and consecutively in space and 
time. The universe is in every place and at any time 
itself, new, and present for the first time. It arises 
and passes away, passes and arises under our very 
hands. Nothing remains the same, only the infinite 
change is constant, and even the change varies. 
Every particle of time and space brings new changes. 
It is true that the materialist believes in the perma- 
nency, eternity, indestructibility of matter. He 
teaches us that not the smallest particle of matter has 
ever been lost in the world, that matter simply 
changes its forms eternally, but that its nature lasts 
indestructibly through all eternity. And yet, in spite 
of all distinctions between matter itself and its perish- 
able form, the materialist is on the other hand more 



82 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

inclined than any one else to dwell on the identity of 
matter and its forms. Inasmuch as the materialist 
speaks ironically of formless matter and matterless 
forms, in the same breath with perishable forms of 
imperishable matter, it is plain that materialism is not 
informed any more than idealism as to the relation of 
content to form, of a phenomenon to the essential na- 
ture of its subject. Where do we find such eternal, 
imperishable, formless matter? In the world of sense 
perceptions we never meet anything but forms of per- 
ishable matter. It is true that there is matter every- 
where. Wherever anything passes away, something 
new instantly arises. But nowhere has any homoge- 
enous, unchangeable matter enduring without any 
form, ever been discovered. Even a chemically indi- 
visible element is only a relative unit in its actual 
existence, and in extension of time as well as in ex- 
tension through space it varies simultaneously and 
consecutively as much as any organic individual 
which also changes only its concrete forms, but re- 
mains the same in its general nature from beginning 
to end. My body changes continually its fleshy tis- 
sue, bones, and every other particle belonging to it, 
and yet it always remains the same. What consti- 
tutes, then, this body which is distinguished from its 
transient form? It is the sum total, in a generalized 
way, of all its varied concrete forms. Eternal and 
imperishable matter exists in reality only as the sum 
total of its perishable forms. The statement that mat- 
ter is imperishable cannot mean anything but that 
there will always and everywhere be matter. It is 
just as true to say that matter is imperishable and 
merely changes its forms, as it is to say that matter 



THE NATURE OF THINGS 83 

exists only in its changing forms, that it is matter 
which changes and that only the change is eternal. 
The terms "changeable matter" and "material change" 
are after all only different expressions for the same 
thing. 

In the practical world of sense perceptions, there 
is nothing permanent, nothing homogeneous, nothing 
beyond nature, nothing like a "thing itself." Every- 
thing is changing, passing, phantomlike, so to say. 
One phantom is chased by another. "Nevertheless," 
says Kant, "things are also something in themselves," 
for otherwise' we should have the absurd contradic- 
tion that there could be phenomena without things 
that produce them." But no ! A phenomena is no 
more and no less different from the thing which pro- 
duces it than the the stretch of a twenty-mile road is 
different from the road itself. Or we may distinguish 
between a knife and its blade and handle, but we know 
that that there would be no knife if there were no blade 
and no handle. The essential nature of the universe is 
change. Phenomena appear, that is all. 

The contradiction between the 'thing itself," or its 
essence, and its outward appearance is fully solved 
by a complete critique of reason which arrives at the 
understanding that the human faculty of thought may 
generalize any number of varied sense perceptions 
under one uniform point of view, by singling out the 
general and equivalent forms and thus regarding every- 
thing it may meet as a concrete part of one and the same 
whole. 

In other words, the relative and transient forms 
perceived by our senses serve as raw material for our 
brain activity, which abstracts the general likeness out 



84 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

of the concrete forms and systematizes or classifies 
them for our consciousness. The infinite variety of 
sense perceptions passes in review before our subjec- 
tive mind, and it constructs out of the multiplicity the 
unity, out of the parts the whole, out of the phenomena 
the essential nature, out of the perishable the imper- 
ishable, out of the attributes the subject. The essence, 
the nature of things, the "thing itself" is an ideal, a 
spiritual conception. Consciousness knows how to 
make sums out of different units. It can take any 
number of units for its sums. The entire multiplicity 
of the universe is theoretically conceived as one unit. 
On the other hand, every abstract sum consists in 
reality of an infinite number of sense perceptions. 
Where do we find any indivisible unit outside of our 
abstract conceptions? Two halves, four fourths, eight 
eighths, or an infinite number of separate parts form 
the raw material out of which the mind fashions the 
mathematical unit. This book, its leaves, its letters, 
or their parts, are they units? Where do I begin, 
where do I stop? In the same way, I may call a 
library with many volumes, a house, a farm, and final- 
ly the whole universe, a unit. Is not everything a 
part, is not every part a thing? Is the color of a leaf 
less of a thing than that leaf itself? Perhaps some 
would call the color simply an attribute and the leaf 
its substance, because there might be a leaf without 
color, but no color without a leaf. But as surely as 
we exhaust a heap of sand by scattering it, just as 
surely do we remove all the substance of a leaf when 
we take away its attributes one after the other. Color 
is only the sum of reactions of leaf, light, and eye, and 
so is all the rest of the matter of a leaf an asrsrreeate of 



THE NATURE OF THINGS 85 

interactions. In the same way in which our reason 
deprives a leaf of its color attributes and sets it apart 
as a "thing itself," may we continue to deprive that 
leaf of all its other attributes, and in so doing we final- 
ly take away everything that makes the leaf. Color 
is in its nature no less a substance than the leaf itself, 
and the leaf is no less an attribute than its color. 
As the color is an attribute of a leaf, so a leaf is an attri- 
bute of a tree, a tree an attribute of the earth, the earth 
an attribute of the universe. The universe is the sub- 
stsance, substance in general, and all other substances are 
but its attributes. And this world-substance reveals the 
fact that the nature of things, the "thing itself" as dis- 
tinguished from its manifestations, is only a concept of the 
mind. 

In its universal search from the attribute to the 
substance, from the relative to the absolute, from 
the appearance of things to the true things, the mind 
finally arrives at the understanding that the substance 
is nothing but a sum of attributes collected by brain 
activity, and that the mind itself, or reason, is a sub- 
stantial being which creates abstract mental units out 
of a multitude of sense perceptions and conceives of 
the universe as an absolute whole, as an independent 
"thing itself," by adding all its transient manifesta- 
tions. In turning away full of dissatisfaction from 
attributes, searching restlessly after the substance, 
throwing aside phenomena, and forever groping for 
truth, for the nature of things, for the "thing itself," 
and in finally realizing that this substantial truth is 
merely the sum of all socalled untruths, the totality of 
all phenomena, the mind proves itself to be the creator 
of the abstract concept of substance. But it did not 



86 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

create this concept out of nothing. On the contrary, 
it generated the concept of a world substance out of 
attributes, it derived truth out of manifestations of things. 

The idealist conception that there is an abstract 
nature behind phenomena which materialises itself in 
them, is refuted by the understanding that this hidden 
nature does not dwell in the world outside of the 
human mind, but in the brain of man. But since the 
brain differentiates between phenomena and their na- 
ture, between the concrete and the general, only by 
means of sense perception, it cannot be denied that 
the distinction between phenomena and their nature 
is well founded; only the essential nature of things is 
■ not found back of phenomena, but by means of pheno- 
mena. This nature is materially existent and our fac- 
ulty of thought is a real and natural one. 

It is true of spiritual things as well as of physical 
ones, in fact it is true of all things, metaphysically 
speaking, that they are what they are, not "in them- 
selves," not in their abstract nature, but in contact 
with other things, in reality. In this sense one might 
say that things are not what they seem, but manifest 
themselves because they are existent, and they mani- 
fest themselves in as many different ways as there are 
other things with which they enter into relations of 
time and space. But the statement that things are not 
what they seem requires, in order to be rightly under- 
stood, the modification that whatever manifests itself, 
exists in nature, and its existence is limited by its 
manifestations. "We cannot perceive heat itself," says 
a book on physics written by Professor Koppe, "we 
merely conclude from its manifestations that it is 
present in nature." Thus reasons a naturalist who 



THE NATURE OF THINGS 87 

seeks to understand a thing by practical and diligent 
study of its manifestations, but who seeks refuge in 
the speculative belief in a hidden "thing itself" when- 
ever a lack of understanding of the fundamentals of 
logic embarrasses him. We, on the contrary, con- 
clude that there is no such thing as ''heat itself," since 
it cannot be found, in nature, and we conceive of heat 
as effects of matter which the human brain translated 
into the conception of "heat itself." Because science 
was, perhaps, as yet unable to analyse this conception, 
the profesor says we cannot perceive the natural ob- 
ject which gives rise to this conception. "Heat itself" 
is simply composed of the sum total of its manifold 
effects, and there is nothing else to it. The faculty of 
thought generalizes this variety of effects under the 
concept of heat in general. The analysis of this con- 
ception, the discovery of the general character of the 
various manifestations of heat, is the function of in- 
ductive science. But the conception of heat separated 
from its effects is a speculative idea, similar to Lich- 
tenberg's knife without handle and blade. 

The faculty of thought in touch with sense precep- 
tions produces the nature of things. But it produces 
them no more independently of things outside than do 
the eye, the ear, or any other sense of man. It is not 
the "things themselves" which we see or feel, but their 
effects on our eyes, hands, etc. The faculty of reason 
to generalize different perceptions of the eye permits 
us to distinguish between concrete sights and sight in 
general. The faculty of thought conceives of any con- 
crete sight as an object of sight in general. It further- 
more distinguishes between subjective and objective 
sight perceptions, the latter b~mg s.'erhts which are visi- 



88 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

ble not alone to the individual eye, but to eyesight in 
general. Even the visions of a spiritualist, or such 
subjective impressions as forked lightning, circles of 
fire, caused by excited blood of closed eyes, serve as 
objects for the critical consciousness. A glittering ob- 
ject revealed by bright sunlight miles away is no more 
and no less tangible in substance, no more and no less 
true, than any optical illusion. A man whose ear is 
tingling hears something, though it is not the tinkling 
of bells. Every sense perception is an object, and 
every object is a sense perception. The object of any 
subjective mind is a passing manifestation, and every 
objective perception is but a perishable subject. The 
object of observation may exist in a more tangible, less 
approachable, more stable, or more general form, but 
it is not a "thing itself." It may be perceived not 
alone by my eyes, but also by those of others, not by 
the eyes, but also by the feeling, the hearing, the taste, 
etc. And it may be noticed not alone by men, but also 
by other objects. But nevertheless it appears only as 
a manifestation, it is different in different places, it is 
not today what it is tomorrow. Every existence is re- 
lative, in touch with other things, and entering into 
different relations of time and space with them. 

Every sense perception is an actual and natural ob- 
ject. Truth exists in the form of natural phenomena, 
and whatever is, is true. Substance and attribute are 
only terms for certain relations. They are not con 
tradictions, and, as a matter of fact, all contradictions 
disappear before our faculty of generalization and dif- 
ferentiation. For this faculty reconciles all contradic- 
tions by finding a general quality in all differences. 
Existence, or universal truth, is the general object, the 



THE NATURE OF THINGS 89 

raw material, of the faculty of thought. This material 
is of the utmost variety and supplied by the senses. 
The senses reveal to us the substance of the universe 
in the forms of concrete qualities, in other words, the 
nature of perceptible matter is revealed to the faculty 
of thought through a variety of concrete forms. It is 
not perceived as a general essence, but only through 
interdependent phenomena. Out of the interdepend- 
ence of the sense perceptions with our faculty of 
thought there arise quantities, general concepts, things, 
true perceptions, or understood truths. 

Essence and truth are two terms for the same 
thing. Truth, or the essence and nature of things, is a 
theoretical concept. As we have seen, we receive im- 
pressions of things in two ways, viz., a sense impres- 
sion and a mental impression, the one practical, the 
other theoretical. Practice furnishes us with the sense 
impression, theory with the mental nature of things. 
• Practice is the premise of theory, sense perception the 
premise of the nature which is also called the truth. 
The same truth manifests itself in practice either 
simultaneously or consecutively in the same place or in 
different places. It exists theoretically as a homogeneous 
conception. 

Practice, phenomena, sense perceptions, are abso- 
lute qualities, that is to say they have no quantitative 
limitation, they are not restricted by time or space. 
They are absolute and infinite qualities. The qualities 
of a thing are as infinite as its parts. On the other 
hand, the work of the faculty of thought, of theory, 
creates at will an infinite number of quantities and it 
conceives every quality of sense perceptions in the 
form of quantities, as the essential nature of things, as 



90 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

truths. Every conception has a quality of some 
sense perception for its object. Every object can be 
conceived by the faculty of thought only as a quantita- 
tive unit, as true nature, as truth. 

The faculty of thought produces in contact with 
sense perceptions that which manifests itself as true 
nature, as a general truth. A primitive concept ac- 
complishes this at first only instinctively, while a 
scientific concept is a conscious and voluntary repeti- 
tion of this primitive act. Scientific understanding 
wanting to know an object, such as for instance heat, 
is not hunting after the phenomena themselves. It 
does not aim to see or hear how heat melts iron or 
wax, how it benefits in one case or injures in another, 
how it makes eggs solid or ice liquid, nor does it con- 
cern itself with the difference between the heat of an 
animal, of the sun, or of a stove. All these things are 
from the point of view of the faculty of understanding, 
only effects, phenomena, qualities. It desires to get 
at the essence, the true nature of things, it strives to 
find a general law, a concise scientific extract, of 
things seen, heard, and felt. The abstract nature of 
things cannot be a tangible object. It is a concept of 
theory, of science, of the faculty of thought. The un- 
derstanding of heat consists in singling out that which 
is common to all phenomena of heat, which is essential 
or true for all heat. Practically the nature of heat 
consists of the sum total of all its manifestations, 
theoretically in its concept, scientific ally in the analysis 
of this concept. To analyse the concept of heat means to 
ascertain that which is common to all manifestations of 
heat. 

The general nature of the thing is its true nature, 



THE NATURE OF THINGS 91 

the general quality its true quality. We define rain 
more truly as being wet than as being fertilizing, be- 
cause it gives moisture wherever it falls, while it ferti- 
lizes only under certain circumstances and in certain 
places. My true friend is one who is constant and 
loyal to me all my life under all circumstances. Of 
course, we must not believe in any absolute and uncon- 
ditional friendship any more than in any absolute and 
eternal truth. Perfectly true, perfectly universal, is 
only the general existence, the universe, the absolute 
quantity. But the real world is absolutely relative, ab- 
solutely perishable, an infinity of manifestations, an 
infinity of qualities. All truths are simply parts of 
this world, partial truths. Semblance and truth flow 
dialectically into one another like hard and soft, good 
and bad, right and wrong, but at the same time they 
remain different. Even though I know that there 
is no rain which is "fertile in itself," and no friend who 
is true in an absolute sense, I may nevertheless refer 
to a certain rain as fertile in relation to certain crops, 
and I may distinguish between my more or less true 
friends. 

The universe is the truth. The universe is that 
which is universal, that is, things which exist and are 
perceived. The general mark of truth is existence, 
because universal existence is truth. Now, existence 
is not a general abstraction, but a reality in the con- 
crete form of sense perceptions. The world of sense 
perceptions has its true and perceptible existence in 
the passing and manifold manifestations of nature and 
life. Therefore all manifestations are recognized as 
relative truths, all truths as concrete and temporal 
manifestations. The manifestation of practice is con- 



92 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

sidered as a truth in theory, and vice versa, the truth 
of theory is manifested in practice. Opposites are mu- 
tually relative. Truth and error differ only compara- 
tively, in volume of degree, like being and seeming, life 
and death, light and dark, like all other opposites in the 
world. It is a matter of course that all things of this 
world are worldly, consequently are of the same mat- 
ter, the same nature, the same family, the same quality. 
In other words, every volume of perceptible manifes- 
tation forms in contact with the human faculty of 
thought a being, a truth, a general thing. For our 
consciousness, every particle of dust as well as every 
dust cloud, or any other mass of material manifesta- 
tions, is on the one hand an abstract "thing in itself," 
and on the other a passing phenomenon of the abso- 
lute object, the universe. Inside of this universe the 
various manifestations are systematized or generalized 
at will and on purpose by means of our mind. The 
chemical element is as much a manysided system as 
the organic cell or the whole vegetable kingdom. The 
smallest and the largest being is divided into individu- 
als, species, families, classes, etc. This systematiza- 
tion, this generalization, this generation of beings is 
continued in an ascending scale up to the infinity of 
the universe, and in the descending scale down to the 
infinity of the parts. In the eyes of the faculty of 
thought all qualities become abstract things, all things 
relative qualities. 

Every thing, every sense perception, no matter 
how subjective or shortlived it may be, is true, is a cer- 
tain part of truth. In other words, the truth exists, not 
only in the general existence, but every concrete existence 
has also its own distinct generality or truth. Every 



THE NATURE OF THINGS 93 

object, whether it be a mere passing idea, or a vola- 
tile scent, or some tangible matter, constitutes a sum 
of manifold phenomena. The faculty of thought turns 
various quantities into 01:3, discerns the equality in 
different things, seeks the unity in the multiplicity. 
Mind and matter have at least actual existence in 
common. Organic nature agrees with inorganic nature 
in being material. It is true that there are wide di- 
vergences between man, monkey, elephant, and plants 
attached to the soil, but even greater differences are 
reconciled under the term "organism." However 
much a stone may differ from a human heart, thinking 
reason will discover innumerable similarities in them. 
They at least agree in being matter, they are both 
visible, tangible, and may be weighed, etc. Their dif- 
ferences are as manifold as their likenesses. Solomon 
truly says that there is nothing new under the sun, and 
Schiller also says truly that the world grows old and 
again grows young. What abstract thing, being, existence, 
generality is there that is not manifold in its sense mani- 
festations, and individually different from all other 
things? There are no two drops of water alike. I 
am now in many respects different from what I was 
an hour ago, and the likeness between my brother and 
myself is only relatively greater than the likeness be- 
tween a watch and an oyster. In short, the faculty 
of thought is a faculty of absolute generalization, it 
classes all things without exception under one head, it 
comprises and understands everything uniformly, while 
sense perceptions show absolutely everything in a differ- 
ent, new and individual light. 

If we apply this metaphysics* to our study, the fac- 

*E. g., this all-embracing physics. — Editor. 



94 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

ulty of thought, we see that its functions, like all 
other things, are material manifestations, which are 
all equally true. All manifestations of the mind, all 
ideas, opinions, errors, partake of a certain truth, all 
of them have a kernel of truth. Just as inevitably as 
a painter derives all forms of his creation from per- 
ceptible objects around him, so are all ideas, images 
of true things, theories of true objects. So far as per- 
ceptions are perceptions, it is a matter of course that 
all perceptions perceive something. So far as knowl- 
edge is knowledge, it requires no explanation that 
all knowledge knows something. -This follows from 
the rule of identity, according to which a equals a, 
or from the rule of contradiction, according to which 
100 is not 1,000. 

All perceptions are thoughts. One might claim, 
on the other hand, that all thoughts are not percep- 
tions. One might define "perceiving" as a special 
kind of thought, as real objective thought in distinc- 
tion from supposing, believing, or imagining. But 
it cannot be denied that all thoughts have a common 
nature, in spite of their many differences. Thought 
is treated in the court of the faculty of thought like 
all other things, it is made uniform. No matter how 
different the thoughts I had yesterday may be from 
those I have to-day, no matter how much the thoughts 
of different human beings may vary at different times, 
no matter how clearly we may distinguish between 
such thoughts as those expressed by the terms idea, 
conception, judgment, conclusion, impression, etc., 
they each and all possess the same common and uni- 
versal nature, because all of them are manifestations 
of mind. 



THE NATURE OF THINGS 95 

It follows, then, that the difference between true 
and erroneous thoughts, between understanding and 
misunderstanding, like all other differences, is only 
relative* A thought "in itself" is neither false nor 
true, it is either of these only in relation to some other 
object. Thoughts, conceptions, theories, natures, 
truths, all have this in common that they belong to 
some object. We have seen that any object is a part 
of the multiplicity of sense perceptions in the world 
outside of our brains. After as much of the universal 
being as constitutes the object which is to be under- 
stood has been defined by some customary term of 
language, truth is to be found in the discovery of the 
general nature of this perceptible part of being. 

The perceptible parts of being which constitute 
the things of this world have not only a semblance 
and manifestation, but also a true nature which is 
given by means of their manifestation. The nature 
of things is as infinite in number as the world of sense 
perceptions is infinitely divisible in space and time. 
Every part of any phenomenon has its own nature, 
every special phenomenon has its general truth. A 
phenomenon is perceived in touch with the senses, 
while the true or essential nature of things is perceived 
in contact with our faculty of thought. In this way 
we find ourselves face to face with the necessity of 
speaking here, where the nature of things is up for 
discussion, simultaneously of the faculty of thought, 
and on the other hand of dealing with the nature of 
things when the faculty of thought is our main sub- 
ject. 

We said at the outset : The criterion of truth in- 
cludes the criterion of reason. Truth, like reason, 



96 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

consists in developing a general concept, or an ab- 
stract theory, from a given sum of sense perceptions. 
Therefore it is not abstract truth which is the criterion 
of true understanding, but we rather refer to that un- 
derstanding as being true which produces the truth, 
or the general hall-mark of any concrete object. 
Truth must be objective, that is to say it must be the 
truth about some concrete object. Perceptions 
cannot be true to themselves, they are true only 
in relation to some definite object, and to some out- 
side facts. The work of understanding consists in 
the abstraction of the general hall-mark from concrete 
objects. The concrete is the measure of the general, 
the standard of truth. Whatever is, is true, no matter 
how much or how little true it may be. Once we have 
found existence, its general nature follows as truth 
itself. The difference between that which is more or 
less general, between being and seeming, between 
truth and error, is limited to definite conditions, for 
it presupposes the relation to some special object. 
Whether a perception is true or false will, therefore, 
depend not so much on perception as on the scope of 
the question which perception tries to solve of its own 
accord or which it is called upon to solve by external 
circumstances. A perfect understanding is possible 
only within definite limits. A perfect truth is one 
which is always aware of its imperfection. For in- 
stance, it is perfectly true that all bodies have weight 
only because the concept of "body" has previously 
been limited to things which have weight. After rea- 
son has assigned the conception of "body in general" 
to things of various weights, it is no longer a matter 
for surprise to find that bodies must inevitably have 



THE NATURE OF THINGS 97 

weight. Once it is assumed that the term "bird" was 
abstracted exclusively from flying animals, we may 
be sure that all birds fly, whether they are in heaven, 
on earth, or in any other place. And to explain this 
we do not require the belief in a priori conceptions 
which are supposed to differ from empirical concep- 
tions by their strict necessity and generality. Truths 
are valid only under certain conditions, and under cer- 
tain conditions errors may be true. It is a true per- 
ception that the sun is shining, provided we under- 
stand that the sky is not covered by clouds. And it 
is no less true that a straight stick becomes crooked 
in flowing water, provided we understand that this 
truth is an optical one. Truth is that which is com- 
mon or general to our reasoning faculty within a 
given circle of sense perceptions. To call within a 
definite circle of sense perceptions that which is ex- 
ceptional or special the rule or the general, is error. 
Error, the opposite of truth, arises when the faculty 
of thought, or consciousness, inadvertently or short- 
sightedly and without previous experience concedes 
to certain phenomena a more general scope than is 
supported by the senses, for instance when it hastily 
attributes to what is in fact only an optical existence, 
a supposed plastic existence also. 

The judgment of error is a prejudice. Truth and 
error, understanding and misunderstanding, knowing 
and not knowing, have their common habitation in 
the faculty of thought which is the organ of science. 
Thought at large is the general expression of experi- 
enced facts perceived by the senses, and it includes 
errors as well. Error is distinguished from truth in 
that the former assigns to any definite fact of which 



98 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

it is a manifestation, a wider and more general exis- 
tence than is supported by sense perceptions and ex- 
perience. Unwarranted assumption is the nature of error. 
A glass bead does not become a counterfeit, until it pre- 
tends to be a genuine pearl. 

Schleiden says of the eye : "When the excited 
blood expands the veins and presses on the nerves, 
we feel it in the ringers as pain, we see it in the eyes 
as forked lightning. And thus we obtain the irre- 
futable proof that our conceptions are free creations 
of the mind, that we do not perceive the external 
world as it really is, but that its reflex actions on us 
simply give rise to a peculiar brain activity, on our 
part. The products of this activity are frequently 
connected with certain processes of the external world, 
but frequently they are not. We close our eyes and 
we see a circle of light, but there is in reality no shin- 
ing body. It is easy to see that this may be a great 
and dangerous source of errors of all kinds. From 
the teasing forms of a misty moonlight night to the 
threatening and insanity-producing visions of the be- 
liever in ghosts we meet a series of illusions which 
are not derived from any direct processes of external 
nature, but belong to the field of the free activity of 
the mind which is subject to error. It requires great 
judgment and wide education, before the mind learns 
to break away from all its own errors and to control 
them. Reading in general seems so easy, and yet it is a 
difficult art. It is only by degrees that the mind learns 
to understand which of the messages of the nerves 
may be trusted and used as a basis for conceptions. 
The light, if we consider it entirely by itself, is not 
clear, not yellow, nor blue nor red. The light is a 



THE NATURE OF THINGS 99 

movement of a very fine and everywhere diffused 
substance, the ether." 

The beautiful world of light and splendor, of color 
and form, is supposed not to be a perception of some- 
thing which really is. "Through the thick covering 
of the grape arbor, a ray of sunlight undulates into 
the cooling shadows. You think you see the ray of 
light itself, but what you really see is nothing but a 
flock of dust particles." The truth about light and 
color is said to be that they are "waves rushing 
through ether in restless succession at the rate of 
160,000 miles per second." This true physical nature 
of light and color is supposed to be so illusive, that 
"it required the sharp intellects of the greatest think- 
ers to reveal to us this true nature of light. We find 
that every one of our senses is susceptible only to 
definite external influences, and that the stimulation 
of different senses produces different conceptions in 
our mind. Thus the sense organs are the mediators 
between the external soulless world (undulations of 
the ether), which is revealed to us by science, and the 
beautiful world of sense perceptions in which we find 
ourselves with our minds." 

Schleiden thus gives an illustration of the fact that 
there is still a great deal of embarrassment, even in 
our times, when the understanding of these two 
worlds is under discussion, that there is still much 
helpless groping to explain the connection between the 
world of thought, of knowledge or science, which is 
in this case represented by undulations of the ether, 
and between the world of our five senses, represented 
by the bright and colored lights of the eyes or of re- 
ality. At the same time this illustration shows how 



100 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

queer the traditional survivals of speculative philosophy 
sound in the mouth of a modern scientist. The con- 
fused condition of this mode of thought is seen in the 
distinction between "an external sense-perceived 
world of science" and another one, "in which we find 
ourselves with our minds." The distinction between 
the senses and the mind, between theory and practice, 
between the special and the general, between truth 
and error, has been noticed by such thinkers, but they 
have no solution for it. They know there is some- 
thing missing, but they do not know where to look 
for it, and therefore they are confused. 

The great scientific achievement of the XlXth cen- 
tury consists in the victory over speculation, over 
knowledge without sense perception, in the delivery 
of the senses from the thraldom of such knowledge, and 
in the foundation of empirical investigation. To ac- 
knowledge the theoretical value of this achievement 
means to come to an understanding about the source 
of error. Contrary to a philosophy that tries to dis- 
cover truth with the mind, and error with the senses, 
we seek for truth with the senses and regard the mind 
as the source of errors. The belief in certain messages 
of the nerves which are alone worthy of confidence 
and which can be understood only by degrees without 
any specific mark of distinction, is a superstition. Let 
us have confidence in all testimonials of the senses. 
There is nothing false to be separated from the genu- 
ine. The supernatural mind idea is the only deceiver 
whenever it undertakes to disregard the sense percep- 
tions, and, instead of being the interpreter of the 
senses, tries to enlarge their statements and repeat 
what has not been dictated. The eye, in seeing forked 



THE NATURE OF THINGS 101 

lightning or radiant circles when the blood is excited 
or a pressure exerted on it, perceives no more errors 
than it does in perceiving any other manifestation of 
the external world. It is our faculty of thought which 
makes a mistake, by regarding without further in- 
quiry such subjective events as objective bodies. One 
who sees ghosts does not commit any mistake, until 
he claims that his personal apparition is a general 
phenomenon, until he prematurely takes something 
for an experience which he has not experienced. Error 
is an offense against the law of truth which prescribes 
to our consciousness that it must remember the limits 
within which a perception is true, or general. Error 
makes out of something special a generality, out of a 
predicate a subject, and takes the part for the whole. 
Error makes a priori conclusions, while truth, its opposite, 
arrives at understanding by a posteriori reasoning. 

A priori and a posteriori understanding are re- 
lated in the same way as philosophy and natural sci- 
ence, taking the latter in the widest meaning of the 
term, that of science in general. The contrast be- 
tween believing and knowing is duplicated in that 
between philosophy and natural science. Speculative 
philosophy, like religion, lives on faith. The modern 
world has transformed faith into science. The re- 
actionists in politics who demand that science retrace 
its steps desire its return to faith. The content of faith 
is acquired without exertion. Faith makes a priori 
perceptions, while science arrives at its knowledge by 
hard a posteriori study. To give up faith means to 
give up taking things easy. And to confine science to 
a posteriori knowledge means to decorate it with the 
characteristic mark of modern times, work. 



102 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

It is not a result of scientific study., but merely a 
freak of philosophy on the part of Schleiden to deny 
the reality and truth of light phenomena, to call them 
fantasmagoria created by the free play of the mind. 
His superstitious belief in philosophical speculation 
misleads him into abandoning the scientific method 
of induction and speaking of "waves rushing through 
ether in restless succession at the rate of 160,000 miles 
per hour" as being the real and true nature of light 
and color, in contradistinction to the color phenomena 
of light. The perversion of this mode of procedure 
becomes evident by his referring to the material world 
of the eyes as a "creation of the mind" and to the un- 
dulations of the ether, revealed by the "sharp intellect 
of the greatest thinkers" as "physical nature." 

The truth of science maintains the same relation 
to the sense perception that the general does to the 
special. Waves of light, the so-called truth of light 
and color, represent the "true" nature of light only 
in so far as they represent what is common to all 
light phenomena, whether they are white, yellow, blue, 
or any other color. The world of the mind, or of 
science finds its raw material, its premise, its proof, 
its beginning, and its boundary in sense perception. 

When we have learned that the nature, or the 
truth, of things is not back of their phenomena, but 
can be perceived only by the help of phenomena, and 
that it does not exist "in itself," but only in connection 
with the faculty of understanding, that the nature is 
separated from the phenomena only by thought; and 
when we see on the other hand, that the faculty of 
understanding does not derive conceptions out of it- 
self, but only out of their relations with some phe- 



THE NATURE OF THINGS 103 

nomenon ; then this discussion of the "nature of 
things" is an evidence that the nature of the faculty of 
thought is a conception which we have obtained from 
its sense manifestations. To understand that the 
faculty of thought, although universal in the choice 
of its objects, is nevertheless limited in that it requires 
some object; to recognize that the true thought pro- 
cess, that is to say the thought with a scientific result, 
differs from unscientific thinking by consciously at- 
taching, itself to some external object; to realize that 
truth, or universality, is not perceived "in itself," but 
can be perceived only by means of some given object; 
this frequently varied statement reveals the nature 
of the faculty of thought. This statement re-appears 
at the end of every chapter, because all special truths, 
all special chapters, serve only to demonstrate the gen- 
eral chapter of universal truth, 



IVi 

THE PRACTICE OF REASON IN PHYSICAL SCIENCE 

Although we know that reason is attached to per- 
ceptible matter, to physical objects, so that science 
can never be anything else but the science of the 
physical, still we may, according to the prevailing 
ideas and usage of language, separate physics from 
logic and ethics, and thus distinguish them as different 
forms of science. The problem is then to demonstrate 
that in physics as well as in logic, as also in ethics, 
the general or intellectual perceptions can be prac- 
tically obtained only on the basis of concrete percep- 
tible facts. 

This practice of reason, to generate thought from 
matter, to arrive at understanding by sense percep- 
tions, to produce the general out of the concrete, has 
been universally accepted in physical investigation, 
but only in practice. The inductive method is em- 
ployed, and one is aware of this fact, but it is not un- 
derstood that the nature of inductive science is the 
nature of science in general, of reason. The process 
of thought is misunderstood. Physical science lacks 
the theory of understanding and for this reason often 
falls out of its practical step. The faculty of thought 
is still an unknown, mysterious, mystical being for 
natural science. Either it confounds the function with 
the organ, the mind with the brain, as do the ma- 
104 



THE PRACTICE OF REASON . 105 

terialists, or it thinks with the idealists that the fac- 
ulty of thought is an imperceptible object outside of 
its field. We see modern investigators marching 
toward their goal with firm and uniform steps, so 
far as physical matters are concerned. But they aim- 
lessly grope around in the abstract relations of these 
things. The inductive method has been practically 
adopted by natural science and its successes have se- 
cured a great reputation for it. On the other hand, 
the speculative method has become discredited by its 
failures. There is, however, no conscious understand- 
ing of these various methods of thought. We see the 
men of physical research, when they are outside of their 
special field, offer lawyer-like speculations in lieu of 
scientific facts. While they arrive at the special truths 
of their chosen fields by sense perceptions, they still 
pretend to derive speculative truths out of the depths 
of their own minds. 

Listen to the following statements of Alexander 
von Humboldt, which he makes in the initial argu- 
ment of his "Cosmos" in regard to speculation : "The 
most important result of physical research by sense 
perception is this : that it finds the element of unity 
in a multitude of forms ; that it grasps all the individ- 
ual manifestations offered by the discoveries of re- 
cent times, carefully scrutinizes and distinguishes 
them ; yet does not succumb under their mass ; that 
it fulfills the sublime mission of the human being, of 
understanding the nature of things which is hidden 
under the cover of phenomena. In this way our aim 
reaches beyond the narrow limits of the senses, and 
we may succeed in grasping the nature by controlling 
the raw material of empirical observation through 



106 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

ideas. In my observations of the scientific treatment 
of general cosmic phenomena, I am not deriving unity 
out of a few fundamental principles found by specula- 
tive reason. My work is the expression of a thoughtful 
observation of empirical phenomena seen as one and 
the same nature. I am not going to venture into a field 
which is foreign to me. What I call physical cosmol- 
ogy does not, therefore, aspire to the rank of a rational 
science of nature. . . . True to the character of 
my former occupation and writings, which were de- 
voted to experiments, measurements, and investiga- 
tions of facts, I confine myself in this work to empiri- 
cal observations. It is the only ground on which I 
can move with a measure of security." In the same 
breath Humboldt says that "without the earnest de- 
sire for the knowledge of concrete facts any great 
and universal world philosophy would be merely a 
castle in the air" and in another place that "an un- 
derstanding of the universe by speculative and intro- 
spective reason would represent a still more sublime 
aim" than understanding by empirical thought. And 
on page 68 of volume I. he says : "I am far from find- 
ing fault with endeavors of others the success of which 
still remains in doubt, when I have had no practical 
experience with them." 

Now natural science shares with Humboldt the 
consciousness that the practice of reason in physical 
research consists exclusively in "perceiving the ele- 
ment of unity in a multitude of forms." But on the 
other hand, though it does not always admit its be- 
lief in speculative introspection as frankly as Hum- 
boldt does, it nevertheless proves that it does not fully 
understand the practice of science and that it believes 



THE PRACTICE OF REASON 107 

in a metaphysical as well as a physical science by using 
the speculative method in the treatment of so-called 
philosophical topics, in which the element of unity is 
supposed to be discovered by introspective reason in- 
stead of an analysis of multiform sense perceptions, 
and it demonstrates its lack of unity by being un- 
aware of the unscientific character of disagreements, 
by believing in a metaphysical science outside of the 
physical domain. The relations between phenomenon 
and its nature, cause and effect, matter and force, sub- 
stance and spirit, are certainly physical ones. But 
what is there of unity that science teaches about them? 
Plainly then, the work of science, like that of the 
farmer, has so far been done only practically, but not 
scientifically, not with a predetermination of success. 
Understanding, that is to say the practice of under- 
standing, is well applied in science, I readily admit. 
But the instrument of this understanding, the faculty 
of thought, it misunderstood. We find that natural 
science, instead of applying this faculty scientifically, 
simply experiments with it. What is the reason for 
this? Natural science has neglected the critique of 
reason, the theory of science, logic. 

Just as the handle and the blade of a knife consti- 
tute its general content, so we found that the general 
content of reason was the universal, the general "it- 
self." We know that it does not produce this con- 
tent out of itself, but out of given objects, and these 
objects are the sum of all natural or physical things. 
The object of reason is, therefore, an infinite, unlimited, 
absolute quantity. This infinite quantity manifests it- 
self in finite quantities. In the treatment of relatively 
small quantities of nature the true essence of reason, 



108 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

the true method of understanding, is well recognized. 
It remains to be demonstrated that the great relations 
of the world, the treatment of which is still doubtful, 
are likewise intelligible by the same method. Cause 
and effect, mind and matter, matter and force, are such 
great world problems, and they are of a physical char- 
acter. We shall demonstrate that the most general 
distinction between reason and its object furnishes the 
key to the solution of the great world problems. 

(a) Cause and Effect. 

"The nature of natural history," says F. W. Bes- 
sell, "lies in the fact that it does not consider phenom- 
ena as facts in themselves, but looks for their causes. 
The knowledge of nature is thus reduced to the mini- 
mum number of facts." But the causes of the phenom- 
ena of nature had been investigated even before the 
age of natural history. The characteristic mark of 
natural history is not so much that it investigates 
causes, but that the causes which it investigates have 
a peculiar nature and a particular quality. 

Inductive science has materially changed the con- 
ception of causes. It has retained the term, but uses 
it in a different sense from that employed by specula- 
tion. The naturalist conceives of causes differently 
within his special field and outside of it ; here, outside of 
his specialty, he frequently indulges in introspective spec- 
ulation, because he understands science and its cause in a 
concrete, but not in a general way. The unscientific forces 
are of a supernatural make-up, they are transcendental 
spirits, gods, forces, little and big goblins. The orig- 
inal conception of causes is an anthropomorphic one. 
In a state of inexperience, man measures the objective 



THE PRACTICE OF REASON 109 

by a subjective standard, judges the world by himself. 
Just as he creates things with conscious intent, so he 
attributes to nature his human manner, imagines the 
existence of an external and creative cause of the 
phenomena of sense perception, similar to himself who 
is the special cause of his own creations. This sub- 
jective mood is to blame for the fact that the strug- 
gle for objective understanding has so long been in 
vain. The unscientifically conceived cause is a spec- 
ulation of the a priori kind. 

If the term understanding is retained for subjec- 
tive understanding, then objective science differs from 
it in that such a science penetrates to the causes of its 
objects not by faith or introspective speculation, but 
by experience and induction, not a priori, but a pos- 
teriori. Natural science looks for causes not outside 
or back of nature's phenomena, but within or by 
means of them. Modern research seeks no external 
creator of causes, but rather the immanent system, 
the method or general mode of the various phenomena 
as they are given by succession in time. The unscien- 
tifically conceived cause is a ''thing in itself," a little 
god who generates his effects independently and hides 
behind them. The scientific conception of causes, on 
the other hand, looks only for the theory of effects, 
the general element of phenomena. To investigate a 
cause means then to generalize a variety of pheno- 
mena, to arrange the multiplicity of experienced facts 
under one scientific rule. "The knowledge of nature 
is thus reduced to the minimum number of facts." 

The commonplace and inept knowledge differs from 
the most exalted, rarest, and newly discovered sci- 
ence in the same way in which a petty and childish 



110 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

superstition differs from the historical superstition 
of a whole period. For this reason we may well 
choose our illustrations from our daily circle, instead 
of looking for them in the so-called higher regions of 
a remote science. Human common sense had long 
practiced the investigation of causes by inductive and 
scientific methods, before science realized that it would 
have to pursue its higher aims in the same way. 
Common sense does arrive at the faith in a mysteri- 
ous cause of speculative reason, just like the natural- 
ist, as soon as it leaves the field of its immediate en- 
vironment. In order to stand firmly on the ground 
of real science, every one requires the understanding 
of the manner in which inductive reason investigates 
its causes. 

To this end let us glance briefly at the outcome of 
the study of the nature of reason. We know that the 
faculty of understanding is not a "thing in and by 
itself," because it becomes real only in contact with 
some object. But whatever we know of any object, 
is known not alone through the object, but also 
through the faculty of reason. Consciousness, like 
all other being, is relative. Understanding is contact 
with a variety of objects. To knowledge there is at- 
tached distinction, subject and object, variety in unity. 
Thus things become mutual causes and mutual ef- 
fects. The entire world of phenomena, of which 
thought is but a part, a form, is an absolute circle, in 
which the beginning and end is everywhere and no- 
where, in which everything is at the same time es- 
sence and semblance, cause and effect, general and 
concrete. Just as all nature is in the last instance 
one sole general unity, in view of which all other 



THE PRACTICE OF REASON 111 

unities become a multitude, so this same nature, or 
objectivity, or world of sense perceptions, or what- 
ever else we may call the sum of all phenomena or 
effects, is the final cause of all things, compared to 
which all other causes become effects. But we must 
remember that this cause of all causes is only the sum 
of all effects, not a transcendental or superior being. 
Every cause has its effect, every effect causes some- 
thing. 

A cause cannot be physically separated from its 
effect any more than the visible can be separated from 
the eye, the taste from the tongue, in brief the general 
from the concrete. Nevertheless, the faculty of 
thought may separate the one from the other. We 
must keep in mind that this separation is a mere for- 
mality of thought, although it is a formality which is 
necessary in order to be reasonable or conscious, in 
order to act scientifically. The practice or understand- 
ing, or scientific practice, derives the concrete from the 
general, the natural things from nature. But who- 
ever has been behind the scenes, and has looked at 
the faculty of thought at work, knows that, conversely 
the general is derived from the concrete, the concept 
of nature from natural things. The theory of under- 
standing or science teaches us that the antecedent is 
understood by its consequent, the cause by its effect, 
while our practical understanding regards the after 
as a consequence of the before, the effect as a result 
of the cause. The faculty of understanding, the organ 
of generalization, regards its opposite, the concrete, 
as secondary, while the faculty of thought which un- 
derstands itself regards it as primary. However, the 
practice of understanding is not to be changed by its 



112 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

theory, nor can it be; the theory intends simply to 
render the steps of consciousness firm. The scientific 
farmer differs from the practical farmer, not because 
he employs theory and method, for both do that, but 
because he understands the theory, while the practical 
man theorizes instinctively. 

To continue : From a given multitude of facts, 
reason generates truth in general, and out of a suc- 
cession of forms and transformations it abstracts the 
true cause. Just as absolute multiplicity is the nature 
of space, so absolute variability is the nature of time. 
Every particle of time and space is new, original, and 
has never been there before. The faculty of thought 
enables us to find our way through this absolute 
medley by abstracting general concepts out of the 
multitude of things in space, and tracing the varia- 
tions of time to general causes. The entire nature 
of reason consists in generalizing sense perceptions, 
in abstracting the common elements out of concrete 
things. Whoever does not fully understand reason 
by understanding that it is the organ of generaliza- 
tion forgets that understanding requires an object 
which must remain something outside of its concep- 
tion, since such object cannot be dissolved by its con- 
ception. The being of the reasoning faculty cannot 
be understood any more than being in general. Or 
rather, being is understood when we take it in its gen- 
erality. Not being itself, but the general element of 
being, is understood by the faculty of thought. 

Let us realize, for instance, the process which takes 
place when reason understands something it did not 
know before. Think of some peculiar, unexpected 
and unknown chemical transformation which takes 



THE PRACTICE OF REASON 113 

place suddenly and without apparent cause in some 
mixture. Assume furthermore that the same reaction 
takes place more frequently after that, until experi- 
ence demonstrates that this inexplicable change oc- 
curs whenever sunlight touches the mixture. This 
already constitutes a certain understanding of the pro- 
cess. Assume furthermore that subsequent experi- 
ence teaches us that several other substances have 
the faculty of producing the same reaction in connec- 
tion with sunlight. We have then arranged the new 
reaction in line with a number of phenomena of the 
same class, that is to say we have enlarged, deepened, 
completed our understanding of it still more. And 
if we finally discover that a special part of the sun- 
light unites with a special element of the mixture and 
thereby produces this new reaction, we have general- 
ized this experience, or experienced this generaliza- 
tion, in a "pure" state, in other words, the theory of 
this reaction is complete, reason has solved its prob- 
lem, and yet it has done nothing more than it did 
when it classified the animal and vegetable kingdoms 
in families, genera, species, etc. To find the species, 
the genus, the sex, etc., of anything means to under- 
stand it. 

Reason proceeds in the same way when it investi- 
gates the causes of certain transformations. Causes 
are, in the last instance, not noticed and furnished by 
means of sight, hearing, feeling, not by means of the 
sense perceptions. They are rather supplied by the 
faculty of thought. It is true, causes are not the 
"pure" products of the faculty of thought, but are 
produced by it in connection with sense perceptions 
and their material objects. This raw material gives 



114 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

the objective existence to the causes produced by the 
mind. Just as we demand that a truth should be the 
truth about some objective phenomenon, so we also 
demand that a cause should be real, that it should be 
the cause of some objective effect. 

The understanding of any concrete cause is con- 
ditioned on the empirical study of its material, while 
the understanding of any general cause is based on the 
study of the faculty of reason. In the understanding 
of concrete causes, the material of study varies, but 
reason maintains a constant or general attitude. The 
cause, as a general cause, is a pure conception, and it 
is based on the study of the multiformity of concrete 
understandings of causes, or on the multiplied study 
of concrete causes. Hence we are compelled to return 
to the concrete material of the general concept, to the 
understanding of concrete causes, if we wish to analyze 
the concept of a general cause. 

When a stone falls into the water and causes rip- 
ples on the surface, the stone is no more the cause of 
the ripples than the liquid condition of the water. If 
the stone falls on solid substances, it causes no rip- 
ples. It is the contact of the falling stone with liquid 
substances which causes the ripples. The cause is 
itself an effect, and the effect, the ripples, become a 
cause when they carry a piece of cork ashore. But 
in either case the cause is based on a mutual effect, on 
the interaction of the waves with the light condition 
of the cork. 

A stone falling into the water is not a cause "in it- 
self," not a cause in general. We arrive at such a 
cause only, when the faculty of thought uses concrete 
causes for its raw material and constructs out of them 



THE PRACTICE OE REASON 115 

the "pure" concept of the cause in general. A stone 
falling into the water is only the cause of the subse- 
quent ripples, and it becomes a general cause only 
through the experience that ripples always follow 
the falling of a stone into water. 

We call cause that which generally precedes a 
certain manifestation, and effect that which gener- 
ally follows it. We refer to the stone as the cause of 
ripples merely because we know that it always causes 
them when falling into water. But since ripples some- 
times appear without being preceded by the fall of a 
stone, ripples have another general cause. So far as 
there is anything general in ripples which precedes 
them, it is the elasticity of the water itself which is 
the general cause of ripples. Circular ripples, which 
are a special form of ripples, are generally preceded 
by the falling of some body into the water, and this 
body is then considered as their cause. The cause 
is always different in proportion and to the extent of 
the phenomena under consideration. 

We cannot ascertain causes by mere introspective 
reasoning, we cannot derive them out of our head. 
Matter, materials, sense perceptions are required for 
this purpose. A definite cause requires a definite ma- 
terial, a definite amount of sense perceptions. In the 
abstract unity of nature, the variations of matter are 
represented by the variations of concrete quantities. 
Every quantity is given in time before and after a 
certain other quantity, as antecedent and subsequent. The 
general element of the antecedent is called cause, the gen- 
eral element of the subsequent, effect. 

When the wind sways a forest, the yielding charac- 
ter of the forest is as much instrumental in producing 



116 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

this effect as the bending-, power of the wind. The 
cause of a thing is its connection with other things. 
The fact that the same wind leaves rocks and walls 
standing shows that the cause is not qualitatively dif- 
ferent from the effect, but that it is a matter of aggre- 
gate effects. If nevertheless science or knowledge 
determines any special fact to be the cause of any 
change, that is to say of any succession of phenomena, 
this cause is no longer regarded as the external crea- 
tor, but merely as the general mode, the immanent 
method of succession. A definite cause can be ascer- 
tained only when we have under consideration a 
definite circle, series, or number of changes, the cause 
of which is to be determined. And within a definite 
circle of succeeding phenomena, that which generally 
precedes is their cause. 

The wind which sways a forest differs from wind 
as a general cause only in that the latter has other gen- 
eral effects, inasmuch as it howls in one place, stirs 
up dust in another, or acts in many different ways. 
In the special case of the forest, the wind is a cause 
only in so far as it precedes the swaying of the trees. 
But in the case of rocks and walls, the solidity pre- 
cedes the wind and is therefore the general cause of 
their resistance to the swaying power of the wind. In 
a still wider circle of hurricane phenomena, a gentle 
wind may be regarded as a cause of the stability of 
the objects last mentioned. 

The quantity or number of given objects varies 
the name of their cause. If a certain company of peo- 
ple return from a walk in a tired condition, this change 
of condition is just as much due to the physical weak- 
ness of the people as to the walk. In other words, 



THE PRACTICE OF REASON 117 

a manifestation has in itself no cause which can be 
separated from it. Everything which was connected with 
a phenomenon has contributed toward its appearance. In 
the case of the promenaders, the physical constitution of 
their bodies has to be considered as well as the physical 
constitution and length of the road and duration of the 
walk. If reason is nevertheless called upon to determine 
the special cause of some concrete change, for instance, of 
a tired feeling, it is simply a question of determining 
which one of the various factors has contributed most 
to that feeling. In this case as well as in all others, 
the work of reason consists in developing the general 
from the concrete, that is to say in this case, singling 
out from a given number of tired sensations that 
which generally precedes the tired feeling. If most of 
the promenaders or all of them are found to be tired, 
the walk will be considered as the cause. But if only 
a few are tired, the weak constitution of these people 
will be considered as the general cause of their tired 
condition. 

To use another illustration : If the discharge of 
a shot frightens some birds, this effect is due to the 
combined action of the shot and the timidity of the 
birds. If the majority of the birds fly away, the shot 
will be considered as the cause. But if the minority 
fly away, their timidity will be regarded as the cause. 

Effects are subsequences. Since all things in na- 
ture follow other things and all things have an ante- 
cedent and a subsequent, we may call the natural, the 
real, the sense perceptions absolute effects, having no 
cause unless we find one with our faculty of thought 
by systematizing the given material. Causes are men- 
tal generalizations of perceptible changes. The sup- 



118 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

posed relation of cause and effect is a miracle, a crea- 
tion of something out of nothing. For this reason this 
relation has been and still is an object of speculative 
reasoning. The speculative cause creates its effects. 
But in reality the effects are the material out of which 
the brain, or science, forms its causes. The cause con- 
cept is a product of reason ; not of "pure" reason, but 
of reason married to the world of sense perceptions. 
If Kant maintains that the statement: "Every 
change has its cause" is an a priori truth which we 
cannot experience because no one can possibly ex- 
perience all changes, although every one has the irre- 
futable feeling of the correctness of this statement, 
we know now that this statement expresses merely the 
experience that the phenomenon which we call reason 
recognizes the uniform element in all multiformity. 
Or in other words, we now know that the development of 
the general element out of the concrete facts is called 
reason, thought, or mind. The secure knowledge that 
every change has its cause is nothing else but the con- 
viction that we are thinking human beings. Cogito, 
ergo sum. I think, therefore I am. We have experi- 
enced the nature of our reason instinctively even if 
we have not analyzed it scientifically. We are as well 
aware of the faculty of our reason to abstract a cause 
out of every given change, as we are that every circle 
is round, that a is equal to a. We know that the gen- 
eral is the product of reason, and reason produces 
this general thing in contact with every given object. 
And since all objects before and after a certain other 
object are temporal changes, it follows that all changes 
which we as thinking beings experience must have 
a general antecedent, a cause. 



THE PRACTICE OF REASON 119 

Already the English sceptic Hume felt that true 
causes are different from assumed causes. According 
to him the concept of a cause contains nothing but the 
experience of that which generally precedes a certain 
phenomenon. Kant rightfully remarks on the other 
hand that the conception of cause and effect expresses 
a far more intimate relation than that indicated by a 
loose and accidental succession, and that the concept 
of a cause rather comprises that of a certain effect as 
a necessity and strict general result. Therefore he 
claimed that there must be something a priori in rea- 
son which cannot be experienced and which extends 
beyond experience. 

We reply to the materialists who deny all au- 
tonomy of the mind and hope to detect causes by ex- 
perience alone that the general necessity which pre- 
supposes the relation of cause and effect represents 
an impossible experience. And we reply to the ideal- 
ists : Although reason- explores causes which cannot 
be experienced, this research cannot take place a pri- 
ori, but only a posteriori, only on the basis of empiri- 
cally given effects. It is true that the mind alone dis- 
covers the imperceptible and abstract generality, but 
it does so only within the circle of certain given sense 
perceptions. 

(b) Matter and Mind. 

The understanding of the general dependence of 
the faculty of thought on material sense perceptions 
will restore to objective reality that right which has 
long been denied to it by ideas and opinions. Nature 
with its varied concrete phenomena which had been 
crowded out of human considerations by philosophi- 



120 TUE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

cal and religious imaginings, and which has been 
scientifically re-established again on special fields by 
the development of natural sciences, gains general 
theoretical recognition by the understanding of the 
functions of the brain. Hitherto natural science has 
chosen for its object only special matters, special 
causes, special forces, but has remained ignorant in 
general questions of so-called natural philosophy re- 
garding the cause of all things, of matter, of force in 
general. The actual existence of this ignorance is 
revealed by that great contradiction between idealism 
and materialism which pervades all works of science 
like a red thread. 

"May I succeed in this letter in strengthening the 
conviction that chemistry as an independent science 
represents one of the most powerful means for the 
higher cultivation of the mind, that its study is useful 
not alone for the promotion of the material interests 
of mankind, but because it permits a deeper penetra- 
tion of the wonders of creation, with which our ex- 
istence, our welfare, and our development are inti- 
mately connected." 

In these words Liebig expresses the prevalent 
views which have accustomed themselves to look 
upon material and spiritual differences as absolute op- 
posites. But the untenability of such a distinction is 
vaguely felt even by the just quoted advocate of this 
view, who speaks of material interests and of a mental 
penetration which is the condition for our existence, 
welfare, and development. But what else does the 
term material interests mean but the abstract expres- 
sion of our existence, welfare, and development? Are 
not these the concrete content of our material interests? 



THE PRACTICE OF REASON 121 

Does he not say explicitly that the penetration of the 
wonders of creation promotes our material interests? 
And on the other hand, does not the promotion ofrour 
material interests require a penetration on our part of 
the wonders of creation? In what respect are our ma- 
terial interests different from our mental penetration 
of things ? 

The superior, spiritual, ideal, which Liebig in con- 
formity with the views of the world of naturalists op- 
poses to our material interests, is only a special part 
of those interests. Mental penetration and material 
interests differ no more than the circle differs from the 
square. Circles and squares are contrasts, but at the 
same time they are but different and special classes of 
form in general. 

It has been the custom, especially since the advent 
of Christian times, to speak contemptuously of ma- 
terial, perceptible, fleshly things which are destroyed 
by rust and moths. And nowadays people con- 
tinue on this conservative track, although their antip- 
athy against perceptible reality has long disappeared 
from their minds and actions. The Christian separa- 
tion of mind and body has been practically abandoned 
in the age of natural science. But the theoretical so- 
lution of the contradiction, the demonstration that 
the spiritual is material and the material at the same 
time spiritual, by which the material interests would 
be freed from the stigma of inferiority, has not yet 
been forthcoming. 

Modern science is natural science. Science is 
deemed worthy of its name only in so far as it is natu- 
ral science. In other words, only that thought is 
scientific which consciously has real, perceptible, nat- 



122 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

ural things for its object. For this reason representa- 
tives and friends of science can not be enemies of na- 
ture or of matter. Indeed they are not. But the very 
existence of science shows that this nature, this world 
of sense perceptions, this matter or substance, does 
alone and by itself not satisfy us.. Science, or thought, 
which has material practice or being for its object, 
does not strive to reproduce nature in its integrity, 
in its entire perceptible substance, for these are al- 
ready present. If science were to aim at nothing new, 
it would be superfluous. It is entitled to special recog- 
nition only to the extent that it carries a new element 
into matter. Science is not so much concerned in the 
material of its study as in understanding. Of course 
it is the understanding of this material which is de- 
sired, the understanding of its general character, of 
the fixed pole in the succession of phenomena. That 
which religion supernaturally separates from the ma- 
terial, which science opposes to the material as some- 
thing higher, diviner, more spiritual, is in reality noth- 
ing but the faculty of rising above multiformity, of pro- 
ceeding from the concrete to the general. 

The nobler spiritual interests are not absolutely 
different from the material interests, they are not 
qualitatively different. The positive side of modern 
idealism does not consist in belittling eating and drink- 
ing, the pleasure in earthly possessions and in inter- 
course with the other sex, but rather in pleading for 
the recognition of other material enjoyments besides 
these, as for instance those of the eye, the ear, of art 
and science, in short of the whole man. You shall not 
indulge in the material revelries of passion, that is 
to say you shall not direct your thought one-sidedly 



THE PRACTICE OF REASON 123 

to any concrete lust, but rather consider your entire 
development, take into account the total general ex- 
tension of your existence. The bare materialist prin- 
ciple is inadequate in that it does not appreciate the 
difference between the concrete and the general, be- 
cause it makes the individual synonymous with the 
general. It refuses to recognize the quantitative su- 
periority of the mind over the world of sense percep- 
tions. Idealism, on the other hand, forgets the quali- 
tative unity in the quantitative difference. It is trans- 
cendental and makes an absolute difference out of the 
relative one. The contradiction between these two 
camps is due to the misunderstood relation of our 
reason to its given object or material. The idealist 
regards reason alone as the source of all understand- 
ing, while the materialist looks upon the world of 
sense perceptions in the same way. Nothing is re- 
quired for a solution of this contradiction but the com- 
prehension of the relative interdependence of these two 
sources of understanding. Idealism sees only the dif- 
ference, materialism sees only the uniformity of matter 
and mind, content and form, force and substance, 
sense perception and moral interpretation. But all 
these distinctions belong to the one common genus which 
constitutes the distinction between the special and the 
general. 

Consistent materialists act like purely practical men 
without any science. But, since knowing and thinking are 
real attributes of man regardless of his party affiliation, 
purely practical men do not exist in reality. Even 
the merest attempt at practical experiment on the 
basis of experienced facts differs only in degree from 
scientific practice based on theoretical principles. On 



124 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

the other hand, consistent idealists are just as impos- 
sible as purely practical men. They would like to 
have the general without the special, the spirit with- 
out matter, force without substance, science without 
experience or material, the absolute without the rela- 
tive. How can thinkers who search for truth, being, 
relative causes, such as naturalists, be idealists? They 
are so only outside of their specialties, never inside of 
them. The modern mind, the mind of natural science, 
is immaterial only so far as it embraces all matters. 
But men like the astronomer Madler find so little of 
the ridiculous in the current expectation of the ma- 
terially increased spiritual power after our "emanci- 
pation from the bonds of matter," that he has nothing 
better to substitute for it and flatters himself with hav- 
ing defined the "bonds of matter" as material attrac- 
tion. Truly, so long as mind is still conceived in the 
form of a religious ghost, the expectation of an in- 
creased mental power after the emancipation from 
the bonds of matter is not so much an object for ridi- 
cule as for compassion. But if we regard mind as the 
expression of modern science, we offer the better sci- 
entific explanation for the traditional faith. By bonds 
of matter we do not mean, in that case, the bond of 
gravitation, but the multiplicity of sense perceptions. 
And matter holds the mind in bondage only so long as 
the faculty of thought has not overcome the multi- 
plicity of things. The emancipation of the mind from 
the bonds of matter consists in developing the general 
element out of the concrete multiplicity. 

(c) Force and Matter. 

The reader who has closely followed our main idea, 



THE PRACTICE OF REASON 125 

which will be further illustrated, will anticipate that 
the question of matter and force finds its solution in 
the understanding of the relation between the general 
and the special. What is the relation of the concrete 
to the abstract? This is the common problem of those 
who see the active impulse of the world either in the 
spiritual force or in the material substance, who think 
to find the nature of things, the non phis ultra of science, 
in either of these facts. 

Liebig, who is especially fond of straying from his 
inductive science into the field of speculative thought, 
says in an idealist sense : "Force cannot be seen, we 
cannot grasp it with our hands ; in order to under- 
stand its nature and peculiarities, we must investigate 
its effects." And if a materialist replies to him : "Mat- 
ter is force, force is matter, no matter without force, 
no force without matter," it is plain that either has 
determined this relation only negatively. In certain 
shows, the clown is asked by the manager: "Clown, 
where have you been?" "With the others," answers 
the clown. "And where were the others?" — "With 
me." 

In this case we have two answers with the same 
content, in the other we have two camps which quar- 
rel with different words about an indisputable fact. 
And this dispute is so much more ridiculous because 
it is taken so seriously. If the idealist makes a distinc- 
tion between matter and force, he does not mean to 
deny that the real phenomenon of force is inseparably 
linked with matter. And if the materialist claims that 
there is no matter without force and no force without 
matter, he does not mean to deny that matter and 
force are different, as his opponent claims. 



126 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

The dispute exists for a good reason and has its 
object, but this object is not revealed in the dispute. 
It is instinctively kept under cover by both parties, 
so that they may not be in a position where they 
would have to acknowledge their own ignorance. Each 
wants to prove to the other that the other's explana- 
tions are inadequate, and both demonstrate this suf- 
ficiently. Btichner admits in the closing statements 
of his "Matter and Force" that the empirical material 
is insufficient to permit of definite answers to trans- 
cendental questions, and that therefore no positive 
answer can be given to them. And he furthermore 
says that the empirical material "is fully sufficient to 
answer them negatively and to do away with hypothesis." 
This is saying in so many words that the science of the 
materialist is adequate for the proof that his opponent 
knows nothing. 

The spiritualist or idealist believes in a spiritual, 
which means in a ghostlike and inexplicable, nature of 
force. The materialist thinkers, on the other hand, 
are skeptical. A scientific proof of faith or of skepti- 
cism does not exist. The materialist has only this ad- 
vantage over his idealist opponent, that he looks for 
the transcendental, the nature, the cause, the force, not 
back of the phenomenon, not outside of matter. But 
he remains behind the idealist when he ignores the differ- 
ence between matter and force. The materialist dwells 
on the actual inseparability of matter and force and 
does not admit any other reason for a distinction be- 
tween the two than "an external reason derived 
from the demand of our mind for systematization." 
Biichner says in "Nature and Mind," page 66 : "Force 
and matter, separated from one another, are for me 



THE PRACTICE OF REASON 127 

nothing but thoughts, fantasies, ideas without any 
substance, hypotheses which do not exist for any 
healthy study of nature, because all phenomena of na- 
ture are rendered obscure and unintelligible by such a 
separation." But if Buchner deals with any special 
department of natural science in a productive way, in- 
stead of handling phrases of natural philosophy, his 
own practice will show him that the separation of 
forces from matter is not an "external," but an inter- 
nal, an imminent necessity, by which alone we are en- 
abled to elucidate and understand the phenomena of 
nature. Although the author of "Force and Matter" 
chose for his motto : "Now, what I want is — facts," we as- 
sure the reader that this device is more a thoughtless 
word than a serious opinion. Materialism is not so 
coarse-grained that it wants purely facts. Those facts 
which Buchner is looking for are by themselves not 
specifics for his desires. The idealist likewise wants 
such facts. No student of nature wants mere hy- 
potheses. What all cultivators of the field of science 
want is not so much facts as explanations or an un- 
derstanding of facts. Even the materialist will not 
deny that science, the "natural philosophy" of Buch- 
ner not excepted, is more concerned with mental 
forces than with bodily matter, that it cares more for 
force than for matter. The separation of force and 
matter is derived from "the demand of our mind for 
systematization." Very true ! But so does all science 
emanate from the demand of our reason for systemati- 
zation. 

The contradistinction between force and matter is 
as old as that between idealism and materialism. The 
first conciliation between the two was attempted by 



128 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

imagination which, through the belief in spirits, sug- 
gested a secret nature as the cause of all natural phe- 
nomena. Science has of late expelled many of these 
special spirits by replacing the fantastic demons with 
scientific, or general, explanations. And after we 
have succeeded in explaining the demon of "pure" 
reason, it is not difficult to expel the special spirit of 
force by the general explanation of its nature and 
thus to reconcile scientifically the contradiction between 
spiritualism and materialism. 

In the universe which constitutes the object of 
science and of the faculty of reason, both force and 
matter are unseparated. In the world of sense per- 
ceptions force is matter and matter is force. "Force 
cannot be seen." Oh, yes ! Seeing itself is pure force. 
Seeing is as much an effect of its object as an effect of 
the eye, and this double effect and other effects are 
forces. We do not see the things themselves, but 
their effects on our eyes. We see their forces. And 
force cannot alone be seen, it can also be heard, 
smelled, tasted, felt. Who will deny that he can feel 
the force of heat, of cold, of gravitation? We have al- 
ready quoted the words of Professor Koppe to the ef- 
fect that we "cannot perceive heat itself, we merely 
conclude from its effects that this force exists in 
nature." This is saying in other words that we do not 
see, hear, or feel the things themselves, but their 
effects or forces. 

It is just as true to say that we feel matter and not 
its force as it is to say that we feel force and not mat- 
ter. Indeed, both are inseparable from the object, as 
we have already remarked. But by means of the 
faculty of thought we separate from the simultane- 



THE PRACTICE OF REASON 129 

ously and successively occurring phenomena the gen- 
eral and the concrete. For instance, we abstract the 
general concept of sight from the various phenomena 
of our sight and distinguish it by the name of power 
of vision from the concrete objects, or substances, 
of our eyes. From a multitude of sense perceptions 
we develop by means of reason the general element. 
The general element of different water phenomena, 
for instance, is the water power distinguished from the 
substance of the water. If levers of different materials 
but of the same length have the same power, it is plain 
that in this case force is different from matter only in 
so far as it represents the general element of various 
substances. A horse does not pull without force, and 
this force does not pull without the horse. Indeed, in 
practice the horse is force and force is the horse. But 
nevertheless we may distinguish the power of pulling 
from other qualities of the horse, or we may refer to 
the common element in different services of horses as 
general horse power, without thereby starting from 
any other hypothesis than we do in distinguishing the 
sun from the earth. For in reality the sun does not exist 
without the earth, nor the earth without the sun. 

The world of sense perceptions is made known to 
us only by our consciousness, but consciousness is 
conditioned on the world of sense perceptions. Nature 
is infinitely united or infinitely separated, according 
to whether we regard it from the standpoint of con- 
sciousness as an unconditional unit or from the stand- 
point of sense perceptions as an unconditional multi- 
plicity. There is truth in both unity and multiplicity, 
but it is truth only relatively speaking, under certain 
conditions. It matters a great deal whether we look 



130 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

about with the eyes of the body or with the eyes of the 
mind. For the eyes of the mind, matter is force. For 
the eyes of the body, force is matter. The abstract 
matter is force, the concrete force is matter. Matter 
is represented by the objects of the hand, of practice, 
while force is an object of understanding, of science. 

Science is not limited to the so-called scientific 
world. It reaches beyond all classes, it belongs to the 
full depth and width of life. Science belongs to think- 
ing humanity in its entirety. And so it is with the 
separation of matter and force. Only a stultified fan- 
aticism can ignore the practical distinction. The miser 
who accumulates money without adding any wealth 
to his life process forgets that the valuable element of 
money resides in its force, which is different from its 
substance. He forgets that not mere wealth as such, 
not the paltry gold substance, lends a reasonableness 
to the quest for its possession, but its spiritual content, 
its inherent exchange value, which buys the necessities 
of life. Every scientific practice, which means every 
action carried on with a predetermined success and 
with understood substances, proves that the separa- 
tion of matter and force, though only performed in 
thought and existing in thought, is nevertheless not 
an empty phrase, not a mere hypothesis, but a very 
fertile idea. A farmer manuring his field is handling 
"pure" manuring force, in so far as it is immaterial 
for the abstract conception whether he is handling cow 
dung, bone dust, or guano. And in weighing bundles 
of merchandise, it is not the iron, copper, stone, etc., 
which is handled by the pound, but their gravity. 

True, there is no force without matter, no matter 
without force. Forceless matter and matterless force 



THE PRACTICE OF REASON 131 

are nonentities. If idealist naturalists believe in an 
immaterial existence of forces which, so to say, carry 
on their goblin-pranks in matter, forces which we can- 
not see, cannot perceive by the senses and yet are 
asked to believe in, then we say that such men are to 
that extent that naturists, but mere speculators, in other 
words spiritualists. And the word of the materialists 
who refer to the intellectual separation of matter and 
force as a mere hypothesis, is quite as brainless. 

In order that this separation may be appreciated 
according to its merits, in order that our conscious- 
ness may neither etherealize force in a spiritualist sense 
nor deny it in a materialist sense, and in order to com- 
prehend it scientifically, we have only to understand 
the faculty of thought in general or "in itself," that is 
to say its abstract form. The intellect can not operate 
without some perceptible material. In order to dis- 
tinguish between matter and force, these things must 
exist and be experienced by sense perception. By 
means of this experience we refer to matter as the ex- 
pression of force and to force as the expression of 
matter. The perceptible object which is to be studied 
is therefore matter and force in one, and since all ob- 
jects are in their tangible reality such matter and 
force things, the distinction made by the mind consists 
in the general method of brain work, in the derivation 
of the general unity, from the special multiplicity in 
any one and in all given objects. The distinction be- 
tween matter and force is summarized in the universal 
distinction between the concrete and the abstract. To 
deny the value of this distinction is equivalent to de- 
nying the value of any and all distinction, equivalent 
to ignoring the function of the intellect altogether. 



132 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

If we refer to phenomena of sense perception as 
forces of matter in general, then this generalized mat- 
ter is nothing but an abstract conception. But if we 
mean by the term sense perception the various con- 
crete substances, then the general element which em- 
braces the differences of things and pervades and con- 
trols them is force producing concrete effects. And 
whether we say matter or force, the mental which 
science is studying, not with its hands, but with its 
brain, the so-called essence, nature, cause, ideal, su- 
perior or spiritual, is the generality comprising the 
special things. 



PRACTICAL REASON OR MORALITY 

(a) The Wise and Reasonable. 

The understanding of the method of science, the 
understanding of the mind, is destined to solve all the 
problems of religion and philosophy, to explain thor- 
oughly all the great and small riddles, and thus fully 
to restore research to its mission of empirically study- 
ing details. If we are aware that it is a law of reason 
to require some perceptible material, some cause, for 
its operation, then the question regarding the first or 
general cause becomes superfluous. Human under- 
standing is then seen to be first and last cause of all 
concrete causes. If we understand that it is a law of 
reason to require for its operation some given object, 
some beginning at which to start, then the question 
of the first beginning must necessarily become inane. 
If we understand that reason derives abstract units 
out of concrete multiplicities, that it constructs truth 
out of phenomena, substance out of attributes, that 
it perceives all things as parts of a whole, as indi- 
viduals of some genus, as qualities of some object, 
then the question regarding a "thing itself," a some- 
thing which in reality is back of all things, must 
needs become irrelevant. In brief, the understanding 
of the interdependence of reason reveals the unreason- 
ableness of the demand for independent reason. 



134 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

Now, although the main object of metaphysics, 
the cause of all causes, the beginning of all beginnings, 
the nature of things, causes little inconvenience to 
modern science, and even though the needs of the 
present have overcome the leaning for speculation, 
this practical downfall of speculation does not suffice 
for the solution of its problems. So long as the theo- 
retical law is not understood, according to which 
reason requires some concrete object for its operation, 
there is no hope of abandoning objectless thought, 
this malpractice of speculative philosophy, which pre- 
tends to generate knowledge without intercourse with 
objective reality. Our naturalists demonstrate this 
very clearly as soon as they turn from their tangible 
specialties to abstract things. The dispute over ques- 
tions of life's wisdom, of morality, or the quarrel 
over the wise, good, right, or bad, reveals that here is 
the boundary of scientific agreement. The scientific 
explorers of the exact sciences abandon every day 
their inductive method when dealing with social 
problems, and stray off into the regions of speculative 
philosophy. Just as in physics they believe in imper- 
ceptible physical truths, in "things themselves," so in 
social matters they believe in the reasonable, wise, 
right, or bad, in the sense of "things themselves," of 
absolute phases of life, of unconditional conditions. 
It is here where the outcome of our studies, of the 
critique of pure reason, must be applied. 

In recognizing that consciousness, the nature of 
understanding, the mental activity in its general form, 
consists in developing general concepts out of con- 
crete objects, we circumscribe this insight by stating 
that reason develops its understanding out of contra- 



"practical reason" or morality 135 

dictions. It is the nature of the mind to perceive, in 
given phenomena of different dimensions and different 
duration, the nature of things bj^ their semblance, and 
their semblance by their nature; to distinguish in 
wants of various degrees the most essential and neces- 
sary from the less pressing;" to measure within a cer- 
tain circle of magnitudes the large by the small and 
the small by the large, or in other words to compare 
the contrasts of the world with one another, to har- 
monize them by explanation. Common parlance in- 
stinctively calls understanding judging; judging re- 
quires a certain standard. Just as surely as we cannot 
perceive any objects which are "in themselves" great 
or small, hard or soft, clear or dark, just as surely 
as these terms denote certain relations and require a 
certain standard by which their relations can be deter- 
mined, even so does reason require a certain standard 
for the determination of that which is reasonable. 

The fact that we consider certain actions, institu- 
tions, conceptions, maxims of other periods, nations, 
or persons unreasonable is simply due to the applica- 
tion of a different standard, because we ignore the prem- 
ises, the conditions, which cause another's reason to 
differ from our own. Men who differ in their mental 
estimates, in their understanding of things, may be 
likened to the thermometers of Reaumur and Celsius, 
one of which designates the boiling point by 80 and 
the other by 100. A different standard is the cause 
of this different result. On the so-called moral field 
there is no scientific agreement, such as we enjoy in 
some physical matters, because we lack the uniform 
standard which natural science has long since found. 
It is still attempted to perceive the reasonable, good, 



136 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

right, etc., without empirical data, by speculative 
reasoning without experience. Speculation seeks 
the cause of all causes, the immeasurable cause ; 
truth "itself," the unconditional and standardless 
truth ; the unlimited good, the unboundedly reason- 
able, etc. The absence of a standard is the essence of 
speculation, and its practice is characterized by unlim- 
ited inconsistency and disagreement. If there are fol- 
lowers of certain positive religions who agree in the 
matter of morals, they owe this to the positive stand- 
ard which certain dogmas, doctrines and command- 
ments have given them. But if any one tries to per- 
ceive things by "pure" reason, the dependence of this 
reason on some standard will be demonstrated by its 
"impure," that is to say individual, perceptions. 

Sense perception is the standard of truth, or of 
science in general. The phenomena of the outside 
world are the standard of physical truths, and man 
with his many wants is the standard of moral truth. 
The actions of man are determined by his wants. 
Thirst teaches him to drink, need to pray. Wants are 
regulated in the South by southern conditions, in the 
North by northern conditions. Wants rule time and 
space, nations and individuals. They induce the sav- 
age to hunt and the gourmand to indulge. Human 
wants give to reason a standard for judging what is 
good, right, bad, reasonable, etc. Whatever satisfies 
our need is good, the opposite is bad. The physical 
feeling of man is the object of moral standards, the 
object of "practical reason." The contradictory va- 
riety of human needs is the basis for the contradictory 
variety of moral standards. Because a member of a 
feudal guild prospered in a restricted competition, 



ff PRACTICAL REASON^ OR MORALITY 137 

and a modern knight of industry in free competition, 
because their interests differ, therefore their views 
differ, and the one justly considers an institution as 
unreasonable which the other regards as reasonable. 
If the intellect of some person attempts to define by 
mere introspection the standard of reasonableness as 
a general thing, this person makes himself or herself 
the standard of humanity. If reason is credited with 
the faculty of finding within itself the source of moral 
truthj it commits the speculative mistake of at- 
tempting to produce understanding without percepti- 
ble objects. The same mistake is to blame for the 
idea that man is subordinate to the authority of rea- 
son, for the demand that man submit to the dictates of 
reason. This idea transforms man into an attribute 
of reason, while in reality reason is an attribute of 
man. 

The question whether man depends on reason or 
reason on man is similar to the one whether the citi- 
zen exists for the state or the state for the citizen. 
In the last and highest instance, the citizen is the pri- 
mary fact and the state is modified according to the 
requirements of the citizen. But whenever the domi- 
nant interests of the citizenship have acquired the 
authority in the state, then the citizen is indeed de- 
pendent on the state. This is saying in so many 
words that man is guided in minor matters by more 
important ones. He sacrifices the less important, 
minor, particular things to the great, essential, gen- 
eral things. He subordinates his desire for more indi- 
vidual indulgence to his fundamental social needs. It is 
not pure reason, but the reason of a weak body or of 
a limited purse which teaches man to renounce the 



138 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

pleasures of dissipation for the benefit of the general 
welfare. The wants of the senses are the material 
out of which reason fashions moral truths. To single 
out the essential need among different physical needs 
of various degrees of intensity or extension, to sepa- 
rate the true from the individual, to develop general 
concepts, that is the mission of reason. The differ- 
ence between the apparently and the truly reason- 
able reduces itself to the difference between the special 
and the general. 

We recall that reason requires sense perceptions 
for its existence and operation, that it needs some ob- 
ject which it can perceive. Existence is the condition 
or premise of all understanding. Just as the under- 
standing of true existence is the function of natural 
science, so the understanding of reasonable existence 
is the function of wisdom. Reason in general has the 
mission of understanding things as they are. As 
physical science it has to understand what is true, as 
wisdom, what is reasonable. And just as true may be 
translated by general, so reasonable may be translated 
by generally appropriate to need. We saw a while 
ago that a sense perception is not true "in itself," but 
only relatively true, that it is called true or general 
only in relation to other perceptions of lesser impor- 
tance. In the same way, no human action can be rea- 
sonable or appropriate "in itself," it can be reason- 
able only in comparison with some other action which 
attempts to accomplish the same purpose in a less 
practicable, that is an impracticable, form. Just as 
the true, the general, is conditioned on the relation to 
some other object, on a definite quantity of phenom- 
ena, on definite limits, so the reasonable or practicable 



"practical reason" or morality 139 

is based on definite conditions which make it reason- 
able or unreasonable. The end in view is the meas- 
ure of the practicable. The practicable can be deter- 
mined only by some definite object that is wanted. 
Once this object is known, then that action is called 
reasonable which accomplishes it in the fullest, most 
general way, and all other actions appear unreason- 
able compared to it. 

In view of the law which we evolved by our analy- 
sis of pure reason and which showed that all under- 
standing, all thought, is based on some perceptible 
object, on some quantity of sense perceptions, it is 
evident that everything distinguished by our faculty 
of distinction is a certain quantity and that, therefore, 
all distinctions are only quantitative, not absolute, 
only graduated, not irreconcilable. Even the differ- 
ence between the reasonable and the unreasonable, or 
in other words between that which is momentarily 
or individually reasonable and that which is generally 
reasonable, is merely a quantitative distinction, like 
all others, so that the unreasonable may be condi- 
tionally reasonable, and nothing is unreasonable but 
that which is supposed to be unconditionally reason- 
able. 

If we understand that reason requires some per- 
ceptible object, some perceptible standard, then we 
shall no longer try to understand the absolutely rea- 
sonable, the purely reasonable. We shall then limit 
ourselves to look for the reasonable, as for all other things, 
in concrete objects. The definite, accurate, certain, 
uniform result of some understanding depends on the 
definite formulation of the task, on the accurate lim- 
itation of the perceptible quantity which is to be un- 



140 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

derstood. If a certain moment, a certain person, a 
certain class, a certain nation are given and at the 
same time an essential need, a general and predomi- 
nating purpose, then the question regarding the rea- 
sonable or suitable is easily answered. It is true that 
we may also know something of things which are 
generally reasonable for mankind in the aggregate, 
but in that case our standard must be abstract man- 
kind instead of some concrete part of it. Science may 
study the anatomical structure of some concrete body 
as well as the general type of the human body, but 
this again it can do only when it supplies the faculty 
of understanding with general instead of individual 
material. If science divides the whole human race 
into four or five races, by establishing a certain 
standard of physiognomy, and later on discovers some 
individuals or tribes whose characters are so peculiar 
and rare that they cannot be classed under any of the 
established races, the existence of such exceptions is 
not a crime against the physical order of the world, 
but merely a proof of the inadequacy of our scientific 
classification. If, on the other hand, some conven- 
tional mode of thought considers a certain action as 
universally reasonable or unreasonable and then en- 
counters opposition in actual life, convention fancies 
itself exempt from the work of understanding and as- 
sumes to deny civic rights in the moral order of the 
world to its opponents. Instead of realizing the lim- 
ited applicability of its rules by the existence of op- 
posing practices, convention seeks to establish an ab- 
solute applicability of its rules by simply ignoring the 
cause of the opposition. This is a dogmatic proced- 
ure, a negative practice, which ignores facts on the 



"practical reason" or morality 141 

pretense that they are irrational, but it is not a posi- 
tive understanding, not an intelligent knowledge, 
such as manifests itself by the conciliation of contra- 
dictions. 

If our study aims to ascertain what is universally 
human and reasonable, and if these predicates are 
given only to actions which are reasonable and prac- 
ticable for all men, at all times, and under all condi- 
tions, then such concepts are absolute, indeterminate, 
and to that extent meaningless, indefinite generalities. 
We are stating such universal and indeterminate, and 
therefore unimportant and unpractical concepts, when 
we say that physically the whole is greater than a 
part, or that morally the good is preferable to the bad. 
The object of reason is that which is general, but it is 
the generality of some concrete object. The practice 
of reason deals with individual and concrete objects, 
with the things which are the opposite of the general, 
with special and concrete knowledge. In order to 
perceive in physics whether we are dealing with a 
part or with the whole object, we must handle defi- 
nite and concrete objects or phenomena. If we desire 
to ascertain what is morally preferable as good or bad, 
we must start out with a definite quantity of human 
needs. Abstract and general reason, with its socalled 
eternal and absolute truths, is a phantasmagoria of 
ignorance which binds the rights of the individual 
with crushing chains. Real and true reason is indi- 
vidual, it cannot produce any other but individual 
perceptions, and these perceptions cannot be general- 
ized to any greater extent than the general material 
with which they operate. Only that is universally 
reasonable which is acknowledged to be so by all 



142 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

reasons. If the reason of some time, class, or person 
is referred to as rational, and if some other time, class 
or person considers it irrational; if, for instance, the 
Russian noble considers serfdom a rational institu- 
tion and the English bourgeois the so-called liberty of 
his wage worker, both of these institutions are not 
absolutely rational, but only relatively, only in a more 
or less limited circle. 

It is not necessary to state that I do not mean to 
question the great importance of our reason by the 
foregoing remarks. Even though reason cannot in- 
dependently, or absolutely, discern the objects of the 
speculative introspection, such as the objects of the 
moral world, the true, the beautiful, the right, the bad, 
the reasonable, etc., it nevertheless is well fitted to 
distinguish relatively, by means of concrete sense 
perceptions, between general and concrete things, be- 
tween the object and its manifestation, between fun- 
damental needs and fanciful appetites. Although we 
may dispense with the belief in absolute reason and 
consequently realize that there can be no absolute 
peace, still we may call war an unmitigated evil when 
comparing it with the peaceful interests of our time 
or of our class. Not until we abandon our fruitless 
exploring trip after absolute truth, shall we learn to 
find that which is true in space and time. It is pre- 
cisely the consciousness of the relative applicability of 
our knowledge which is the strongest lever of prog- 
ress. The believers in absolute truth have adopted 
the monotonous diagram of "good" men and "ration- 
al" institutions as a basis for their views of life. For 
this reason they oppose all human and historical in- 
stitutions which do not fit into their pattern, but 



"practical reason" or morality 143 

which reality nevertheless produces without regard to 
their brains. Absolute truth is the arch foundation 
of intolerance. On the other hand tolerance proceeds 
from the consciousness of the relative applicability of 
"eternal truths." The understanding of pure reason 
leads to the realization that the consciousness of the 
universal interdependence of reason is the true road 
toward practical reason. 

(b) Morality and Right. 

The nature of our task limits us to the demonstra- 
tion that pure reason is a nonentity, that reason is the 
sum of all acts of individual understanding, that it deals 
only seemingly with pure and general, but in reality 
with practical, or concrete, perceptions. We have 
been discussing that philosophy which pretends to be 
the science of pure or absolute understanding. We 
found its aim to be idle, inasmuch as the development 
of speculative philosophy represents a succession of 
disappointments, because its unconditional or abso- 
lute systems proved to be limited in space and time. 
Our presentation of the matter has revealed the rela- 
tive character of so-called eternal truths. We per- 
ceived that reason was dependent on sense percep- 
tions, we found that any truth required definite limits 
for its determination. As regards more especially 
life's wisdom, we saw that the acquired knowledge of 
"pure" reason manifested itself in practice by the de- 
pendence of the wise or the rational upon concrete 
sense perceptions. If we now apply this theory to 
morality as such, we must be able to establish har- 
mony also in this field, where there is some doubt as 



144 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

to what is right and wrong, by means of the scientific 
method. 

Pagan morality is different from Christian moral- 
ity. Feudal morality differs from modern bourgeois 
morality as does bravery from solvency. In brief, we 
need no detailed illustration to show that different 
times and nations have different moralities. We have 
but to understand that this change is necessary, a 
special characteristic of the human race and of its 
historical development, and we shall then exchange 
the belief in "eternal truths," which every ruling class 
claims to be identical with its own selfish laws, for 
the scientific knowledge that absolute right is purely 
a concept which we derive by means of the faculty of 
thought from the various successive rights. Right as 
an absolute concept means no more and no less than 
any other general concept, for instance, the head in 
general. Every real head is a concrete one and be- 
longs either to man or to some other animal, it is 
either long or broad, narrow or wide, in other words 
it has special peculiarities. But at the same time, 
every concrete head has certain general qualities 
which are universal in all heads, for instance the qual- 
ity of being the superintendent of the body. More- 
over, every head has as many general as individual 
traits, it is no more personal than it is common. The 
faculty of thought abstracts the general traits from the 
actual concrete heads and in this way creates the con- 
cept of the absolute head. Just as the absolute head, 
or the head, is composed of the general qualities of 
all heads, so the absolute right stands merely for the 
general characters of all rights. Both of these con- 
cepts exist merely as ideas, not as objects. 



"practical reason" or morality 145 

Every real right is a concrete right, it is right only 
under certain conditions, at definite periods, for this 
or that nation. "Thou shalt not kill," is right in peace, 
but wrong in war; it is right for the majority of bour- 
geois society that wishes to see the outbursts of pas- 
sion controlled in the interest of its own predominant 
needs, but wrong for the savage who has not arrived 
at the period where a peaceful and social life is ap- 
preciated, and who therefore would consider the above 
commandment as an immoral restriction of his liberty. 
For the love of life_, murder is a detestable abomina- 
tion, for revenge it is a sweet satisfaction. In the 
same way robbery seems right to the robber, wrong to 
the robbed. There can be no question of any absolute 
wrong in' such cases, only of wrong in a relative sense. 
An action is wrong in a general sense only in so far 
as it is generally disliked. Plain robbery is wrong in 
the opinion of the great majority today because our 
generation takes more interest in bourgeois affairs of 
commerce and industry than in the adventures of the 
knights of the road. 

If there were such a thing as an absolutely right 
law, dogma, or action, it would have to serve the wel- 
fare of all mankind under all conditions and at all 
times. But human welfare is as different as men, cir- 
cumstances, and time. What is good for me is bad 
for another, and the thing which may be beneficial as 
a rule may be injurious as an exception. What pro- 
motes some interests in one period may interfere with 
them in another. A law which would presume to be 
absolutely right would have to be right for every one 
and at all times. No absolute morality, no duty, no 
categorical imperative, no idea of the good, can teach 



146 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

man what is good, bad, right, or wrong. That is good 
which corresponds to our needs, that is bad which is 
contrary to them. But is there anything which is ab- 
solutely good? Everything and nothing. It is not the 
straight timber which is good, nor the crooked. 
Neither is good, or either is good, according to wheth- 
er I need it or not. And since we need all things, 
we can see some good in all of them. We are 
not limited to any one thing. We are unlimited, uni- 
versal, and need everything. Our interests are there- 
fore innumerable, inexpressibly great, and therefore 
every law is inadequate, because it always considers 
only some special welfare, some special interest. And 
for this reason no right is right, or all of them are 
right, and it is as right to say "Thou shalt not kill" as 
it is to say "Thou shalt kill." 

The difference between good needs and bad needs, 
right wants and wrong wants, like that between truth 
and error, reasonable and unreasonable, finds its con- 
ciliation in the difference between the concrete and 
the general. Reason cannot discover within itself any 
positive rights or absolutely moral codes any more 
than any other speculative truth. It cannot estimate 
how essential or unessential a thing is, or classify the 
quantity of concrete and general characters, until it 
has some perceptible material to work upon. The un- 
derstanding of the right, or of the moral, like all un- 
derstanding, strives to single out the general charac- 
teristics of its object. But the general is only possi- 
ble within certain defined limits, it exists only as the 
general qualities of some concrete and determined 
perceptible object. And if any one tries to represent 
some maxim, some law, some right in the light of an 



PRACTICAL REASON" OR MORALITY 147 

absolute maxim, law or right, he forgets this neces- 
sary limitation. Absolute right is merely a meaning- 
less concept, and it does not assume even a vague 
meaning until it is understood to stand for the right 
of mankind in general. But morality, or the determi- 
nation of that which is right, has a practical purpose. 
Yet, if we accept the general and unconditional right 
of mankind as a moral right, we necessarily miss our 
practical aim. An act or a line of action which is uni- 
versally or everywhere right requires no law for its 
enforcement, for it will recommend itself. It is only 
the determined and limited law, adapted to certain 
persons, classes, nations, times, or circumstances, 
which has any practical value, and it is so much more 
practical the more defined, exact, precise and the less 
general it is. 

The most universal and most widely recognized 
right or need is in its quality no more rightful, better, 
or valuable than the most insignificant right of the 
moment, than the momentary need of some individual. 
Although we know that the sun is hundreds of thous- 
ands of miles in diameter, we are nevertheless free 
to see it no larger than a plate. And though we may 
acknowledge that some moral law is theoretically or 
universally good or holy, we are free in practice to re- 
ject it momentarily, in parts, or individually, as bad 
and useless. Even the most sacred right of the most 
universal extent is valid only within certain definite 
limits, and within particular limits an otherwise very 
great wrong may be a valid right. It is true that 
there is an eternal difference between assumed and 
true interests, between passion and reason, between 
essential, predominating, general, well-founded needs 



148 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

and inclinations, and accidental, subordinate, special 
appetites. But this difference is not one of two sep- 
arated worlds, a world of the good and a world of the 
bad. It is not a positive, general, continuous, abso- 
lute difference, but merely a relative one. Like the 
difference between beautiful and homely, it depends 
on the individuality of the person who distinguishes. 
That which is a true and fundamental need in one 
case, is a secondary, subordinate, and wrong desire in 
another. 

Morality is the aggregate of the most contradictory 
ethical laws which serve the common purpose of regulat- 
ing the conduct of man toward himself and others in such 
a zvay that the future is considered as well as the present, 
the one as well as the other, the individual as well as the 
genus. The individual man finds himself lacking, inade- 
quate, limited in many zvays. He requires for his comple- 
ment other people, society, and must therefore live and let 
live. The mutual concessions which arise out of these 
relative needs are called morality. 

The inadequacy of the single individual, the need 
of association, is the basis and cause of man's considera- 
tion for his neighbor, of morality. Now since the one 
who feels this need, man, is necessarily an individual, 
it follows that his need must likewise be individual 
and more or less intensive. And since my neighbors 
are necessarily different from me, it requires different 
considerations to meet their needs. Concrete man 
needs a concrete morality. Just as abstract and 
meaningless as the concept of mankind in general is 
that of absolute morality, and the ethical laws derived 
from this vague idea are quite as unpractical and un- 
successful. Man is a living personality, whose welfare 



PRACTICAL REASON" OR MORALITY 149 

and purpose is embodied within himself, who has be- 
tween himself and the world nothing but his needs as 
a mediator, who owes no allegiance to any law what- 
ever from the moment that it contravenes his needs. 
The moral duty of an individual never exceeds his 
interests. The only thing which exceeds those inter- 
ests is the material power of the generality over the 
individuality. 

If we regard it as the function of reason to ascer- 
tain that which is morally right, a uniform scientific 
result may be produced if we agree at the outset on 
the persons, conditions, or limits within which the 
universal moral right is to be determined ; in other 
words, we may accomplish something practical if we 
drop the idea of absolute right and search for definite 
rights applicable to well-defined purposes by clearly 
stating our problem. The contradiction in the various 
standards of morality, and the many opposing solu- 
tions of this contradiction, are due to a misunderstand- 
ing of the problem. To look for right without a given 
quantity of sense perceptions, without some definite 
working material, is an act of speculative reason 
which pretends to explore nature without the use of 
senses. The attempt to arrive at a positive determi- 
nation of morality by pure perception and pure reason is 
a manifestation of the philosophical faith in understanding 
a priori. 

"It is true," said Macaulay in his History of En- 
gland, in speaking of the rebellion against the lawless 
and cruel government of James II., "that to trace the 
exact boundary between rightful and wrongful re- 
sistance is impossible ; but this impossibility arises 
from the nature of right and wrong, and is found in 



150 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

every part of ethical science. A good action is not 
distinguished from a bad action by marks so plain as 
those which distinguish a hexagon from a square. 
There is a frontier where virtue and vice fade into 
each other. Who has ever been able to define the 
exact boundary between courage and rashness, be- 
tween prudence and cowardice, between frugality and 
avarice, between liberality and prodigality? Who has 
ever been able to say how far mercy to offenders ought 
to be carried, and where it ceases to deserve the name 
of mercy and becomes a pernicious weakness?" 

It is not the impossibility of accurately determin- 
ing this limit to which the nature of the difference be- 
tween right and wrong, in the sense of Macaulay, is 
due. It is rather due to the vague thought which be- 
lieves in an unlimited right, in absolute virtues and 
faults, which has not risen to the understanding that 
the terms good, brave, right, and bad are valid always 
and everywhere only in relation to some concrete in- 
dividual who reasons, and that they have no validity 
in themselves. Courage is foolhardiness in the eyes 
of the cautious, and caution is cowardice in the opin- 
ion of the daring. The revolt against existing gov- 
ernments is always right in the eyes of the rebels, al- 
ways wrong in the opinion of the attacked. No action 
can be absolutely right or wrong 

The same qualities of man are good or bad, accord- 
ing to his needs and their uses, according to time and 
place. Here trickery, slyness, and bad faith prevail, 
there loyalty, frankness and straightforwardness. Here 
compassion and charity serve their purpose and pro- 
mote welfare, there ruthless and bloody severity. The 
quantity, the more or less beneficial effect of a human 



"practical reason" or morality 151 

quality, determines the difference between virtue and 
vice. 

Reason can distinguish between right and wrong, 
virtue and vice, only to the extent that it can meas- 
ure the relative quantity of right in any faculty, rule, 
or action. No categorical imperative, no ethical code, 
can serve as a basis for the real practical right. On 
the contrary, ethics finds its justification in the actual 
righteousness of perceptible objects. For general 
reason, frankness is not a better quality than slyness. 
Frankness is preferable to slyness only inasmuch as 
it is quantitatively, that is to say, more frequently, 
better, and more generally appreciated than slyness. It 
follows that a science of right can serve as a guide in 
practice only to the extent that practice has served as 
a basis for science. Reason cannot determine the ac- 
tion of man beforehand, because it can only expe- 
rience, but not anticipate reality, because every man, 
every situation, is new, original, exists for the first 
time, and because the possibilities of reason are con- 
fined to understanding a posteriori. 

Absolute right, or right in itself, is an imagined 
right, is a speculative desire. A scientifically univer- 
sal right requires certain definite and perceptible 
premises which form the basis of the determination of 
the general. Science is not a dogmatic infallibility 
which may say: This or that is right, because it is so 
understood. Science requires for its perceptions some 
external object. It can perceive right only if it rightly 
exists. The universal existence is the material, pre- 
mise, condition, and cause of science. 

From the foregoing follows the postulate that mo- 
rality must be studied inductively or scientifically, not 



152 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

speculatively by the method of traditional philosophy. 
We must not attempt to study absolute, but only rela- 
tive rights, only rights based on certain premises, and 
only this can be the moral problem of reason. Thus 
the belief in a moral order of the world is dissolved 
in the consciousness of human freedom. The under- 
standing of reason, of knowledge, of science, includes 
the understanding of the limited validity of all ethical 
maxims. 

Whatever impressed man as salutary, valuable, 
divine, was exhibited by him in the tabernacle of faith 
as the most venerable thing. The Egyptian wor- 
shiped the cat, the Christian venerates the divine 
providence. So, when his needs led him to live a well- 
regulated life, the benefits of the law inspired him 
with such a high opinion of its noble origin that he 
adopted his own handiwork as a gift of heaven. The 
invention of the mouse-trap or other useful appli- 
ances pushed the cat out of its exalted position. 
Whenever man becomes his own master, takes care of 
himself, and provides for himself, then all other provi- 
dences become useless, and his own mastership 
makes all superior tutelege unbearable. Man is a 
jealous creature. Ruthlessly he subordinates every- 
thing to his own interests, even God and His com- 
mandments. No matter how great or venerable an 
authority any code may have acquired by long and 
faithful service, as soon as new needs oppose it, they 
degrade the divine authority to the ranks of human 
law and transform ancient right into modern wrong. 
The Christian frivolity refused to respect the threat 
of physical retribution which the Hebrew had anoint- 
ed as an authority in moral questions and revered 



"practical reason" or morality 153 

under the maxim : Eye for eye, tooth for tooth. The 
Christian had learned to cherish the blessings of 
peacefulness ; he carried submissive tolerance into the 
holy land, and decorated the vacant tabernacle with 
the gentle injunction to offer the left cheek when the 
right was tired of cuffs. In our times which are Chris- 
tian in name, but very anti-Christian in deeds, the 
long venerated tolerance has long gone out of use. 

Just as every religion has its own peculiar God, so 
every time has its own peculiar right. To this extent, 
religion and morality are in harmony with the worship 
of their sanctum. But they become arrogant up- 
starts whenever they assume to exceed thir natural 
boundaries, whenever they attempt to saddle upon 
all circumstances, under the pretense of offering 
something incomparable, absolute, permanent, that 
which is divine and right at certain times and under 
definite conditions ; whenever they proclaim a success- 
ful remedy for their own peculiar disease as a univer- 
sal patent medicine for all diseases ; whenever they 
overbearingly forget their descent. A law is origi- 
nally dictated by some individual need, and then man- 
kind with its universal needs is supposed to balance 
itself on the thin rope of this one rule. Originally that 
which is really good is right, and thereafter only some 
decreed right is supposed to be really good. That is 
the unbearable arrogance. Ordained right is not sat- 
isfied to serve as the right of this time, this nation or 
country, this class or caste. It wants to dominate the 
whole world, wants to be absolute right, just as if 
a certain pill could be absolute medicine, could be 
good for everything. It is the mission of progress to 
repulse this assumption, to pluck this peacock feather 



154 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

out of the tail of the rooster, by leading mankind on 
beyond the boundaries prescribed by ordained law, by 
extending the world for him, by conquering for his 
cramped interests a wider liberty. The migration 
from Palestine to Europe where the consumption of 
pork does not cause leprosy emancipates our natural 
freedom from a once divine restriction by making it 
irrelevant. But progress does not deprive one God of 
his shoulder straps for the purpose of decorating some 
other God with them. That would merely be an ex- 
change, not an acquirement. Evolution does not 
drive the saints of tradition out of the country; it 
simply retires them from the wrongfully occupied 
field of universality into their peculiar boundaries. 
Progress picks up the child and then pours the water 
out of the bath tub. Though the cat may have lost 
its aureole and ceased to be a God, it does not give up 
catching mice ; and though the Jewish rules for bodily 
cleanliness at certain definite times have long been 
forgotten, a clean body is still highly respected. The 
present wealth of civilization is due only to the 
economical administration of the acquirements of the 
past. Evolution is as much conservative as it is revo- 
lutionary, and it finds as much wrong as right in every 
law. 

It is true that the believers in absolute duty scent 
a difference between moral and legal right. But their 
self-interested narrowness does not permit them to 
realize that every law is originally . moral and that 
every special morality is gradually reduced to the level 
of a mere law. Their understanding reaches into 
other times and other classes, but does not reach 
their own time and class. The laws of the Chinese 



PRACTICAL REASON^ OR MORALITY 155 

and Samoyeds are understood to refer to the peculiar 
requirements of those people. But the rules of bour- 
geois society are supposed to be far more sublime. 
Our present day institutions and moral codes are 
either regarded as eternal truths of nature or reason, 
or as permanent oracular expressions of a pure con- 
science. Just as if the barbarian did not have a bar- 
barian reason; as if the Turk did not have a Turkish 
conscience and the Hebrew a Hebrew one; as if man 
could follow the dictates of some absolute conscience, 
instead of the conscience being conditioned on the 
man. 

Whoever limits the purpose of man to the love 
and service of God, and to eternal blessedness here- 
after, may devoutly recognize the traditions of 
abstract morality as authoritative and guide himself 
accordingly. But whoever regards development, 
education, and blessedness on earth as man's life pur- 
pose, will not think that the questioning of the as- 
sumed superiority of traditional morals is irrelevant. 
It is only the consciousness of individual freedom 
which creates sufficient unconcern for the rules made 
by others to permit a brave advance, which emanci- 
pates us from the striving for an illusory absolute 
ideal, for some "best world," and which restores us to 
the definite practical interests of our time and per- 
sonality. At the same time we are thus reconciled 
with the world as it really is, because we no longer 
regard it as the unsuccessful realization of that which 
ought to be, but rather as the systematization of that 
which cannot but be. The world is always right. 
Whatever exists, is right and is not fated to be other- 
wise until it changes. Wherever there is existence, 



156 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

which is power., there is also right without any further 
condition, because it is right in a formative stage. 
Weakness has no other right than that of striving for 
supremacy and then enforcing a recognition of its 
long denied needs. The study of history shows us 
not only the negative and ridiculous side of the re- 
ligions, customs, institutions and ideas of the past, 
but also their positive, reasonable and necessary side. 
It explains to us, for instance, that the deification of 
animals was due to an enthusiastic recognition of 
their usefulness. And so the study of history shows 
not alone the inadequacy of the things of the present, 
but also demonstrates that they are the reasonable 
and necessary conclusions from the premises of pre- 
vious stages. 

(c) The Holy. 

In the well-known statement: The end sanctifies 
the means, the developed theory of morality finds its 
practical expression. This maxim, used in an ambigu- 
ous sense, may stand as a common reproach for us 
and for the Jesuits. The defenders of the society of 
Jesus make efforts to prove that it is a malignant 
attempt to discredit their clients. We shall not try to 
speak for either party to this dispute, but will devote 
ourselves to the subject matter itself, and seek to sub- 
stantiate the truth and reasonableness of this maxim, 
to rehabilitate it in the public opinion. 

It will be sufficient for the refutation of the most 
general opposition to understand that end and means 
are very relative terms, that all concrete ends are 
means and all means are ends. There is no more of 
a positive difference between great and small, right 



"practical reason" or morality 157 

and wrong, virtue and vice, than there is between 
end and means. Considered as something integral by 
itself, every action has its own end and its means are 
the various moments of which even the shortest action 
is composed. Every concrete action is a means in re- 
lation to other actions which aim at the same com- 
mon effect. But in themselves actions are neither 
ends nor means. Nothing is anything by itself. All 
being is relative. Things are what they are only 
within and by their interrelations. Circumstances 
alter cases. In so far as every action is accompanied 
by other actions, it is a means, and serves a common 
end which exceeds its own special end ; but inasmuch 
as every action is complete in itself it is an end which 
includes its own means. We eat in order to live ; but 
so far as we are living while we are eating, we are 
living in order to eat. As life to its functions, so the 
end is related to its means. Just as life is simply the 
sum of all life's functions, so the end is the sum of all 
its means. The difference between means and end 
reduces itself to that between the concrete and the gen- 
eral. And all abstract differences reduce themselves 
to this difference, because the faculty of abstraction 
or distinction reduces itself to the faculty of distin- 
guishing between the concrete and the general. But 
this distinction presupposes the existence of some 
material, some given objects, some circle of sense per- 
ceptions by which it manifests itself. If this circle is 
"found in the field of actions or functions, in other 
words, if a previously defined number of different 
actions is the object of our study, then we refer to the 
general character of these objects as the general end 
and to every more or less extended part of them, or to 



158 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

every function, as a means. Whether any definite 
action is considered as an end or as a means, depends 
on the question whether we consider it as a whole in 
relation to its own parts, or as a part of some whole 
in which it is connected with other parts, with other 
actions. From a general point of view which has all 
human actions for the object of its study, and encom- 
passes them all, there exists only one end, viz., the 
human welfare. This welfare is the end of all ends, is 
the final end, is the real, true, universal end compared 
to which all special ends are but means. 

Now, our claim that the end sanctifies the means 
can have absolute validity only in regard to some 
absolute end. But all concrete ends are relative and 
finite. The one and sole absolute end is human wel- 
fare, and it is an end which sanctifies all rules and 
actions, all means, so long as they are subservient to 
it, but which reviles them as soon as they go their 
own way without serving it. The human weal is lit- 
erally and historically the origin of the holy. That 
which is hale is holy. At the same time we must not 
ignore the fact that the weal, or hale, in general, the 
hale which sanctifies all means, is but an abstraction, 
the real content of which is as different as are the 
times, the nations, or persons which are seeking for 
their welfare. It must be remembered that the de- 
termination of that which is holy or for the human 
weal requires definite conditions, that no action, no 
means, is holy in itself, that each one of them is sanc- 
tified only by definite relations. It is not every end 
which sanctifies the means, but the holy end which 
sanctifies its own means. But since every real and 



■ "practical reason" or morality 159 

concrete end is only relatively holy, it can sanctify its 
own means only relatively. 

The opposition against our maxim is not so much 
directed against it, as against the wrong application of 
it. Recognition is denied and the socalled sanctified 
ends are accorded only limited means, because there 
is lurking in the background the consciousness that 
these ends have only a relative holiness. On the other 
hand our defense of the maxim does not imply that 
the various nominally holy means and ends are sanc- 
tified because some authority, some scriptural state- 
ment, some reason or conscience, has declared them 
to be so, but only in so far as they answer the common 
end of all ends, the human welfare. Our maxim of 
ends does not at all teach that we should sacrifice love 
and truths to sanctified faith, but neither does it de- 
mand that we should sacrifice faith for love and truth. 
It merely states the fact that, whenever some superior 
end has been determined by sense perceptions or cir- 
cumstances, all means contrary to that end are un- 
holy, and that on the other hand means which are 
generally unholy may become temporarily and indi- 
vidually sanctioned by their relation to some momen- 
tary or individual welfare. Wherever peacefulness is 
actually in favor as a sanctified means, war is unholy. 
When, on the other hand, man seeks his salvation in 
war, then murder and incendiarism are holy means. 
In other words, our reason requires for a valid de- 
termination of that which is sanctified certain definite 
material conditions or facts as premises ; it cannot de- 
termine the holy in general, not a priori, not philo- 
sophically in the old speculative way, but only in con- 
crete cases, a posteriori, only empirically. 



160 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

If we understand that human welfare is the end 
of all ends, the ideal of all means ; if we furthermore 
dispense with all special determinations of this wel- 
fare, with all personal ideas of it, and recognize that 
it is different under different circumstances, then we 
understand at the same time that no means is 
sanctified beyond the sanctity of its end. No 
means, no action, is positively sanctified or makes 
for human welfare under all circumstances. Ac- 
cording to circumstances and relations one and 
the same means may be good or bad. A thing 
is good only to the extent that its results are 
good, only to the extent that there is good in its end. 
Lying and cheating are bad only because they result 
injuriously for ourselves, because we do not wish to 
be lied to or cheated. But whenever a sanctified end 
is in question, the deceptive means used in lying and 
cheating are called tricks of war. If any one is firmly 
rooted in the goodness of chastity because he thinks it 
was ordained by God, we cannot discuss the matter 
with him. But if one honors virtue for the sake of 
virtue and abhors vice for the sake of vice, in other 
words, for their consequences, he admits that he sacri- 
fices the lust of the flesh to the end of good health. In 
short, he admits that the means are sanctified by the 
end. 

In the Christian conception of the world, the com- 
mandments of its religion are absolutely good for all 
time, they are considered good because Christian reve- 
lation declares them to be so. This conception does 
not know that, for instance, its acme of virtue, the 
specifically Christian virtue of abstemiousness, re- 
ceived its value only by contrast with corrupt heath- 



"practical reason" or morality 161 

enish licentiousness, but that it is not a virtue when 
compared to reasonable and normal satisfaction of 
material needs. It deals with certain means which it 
calls indiscriminately good without any relation to 
their ends, and others which it calls indiscriminately 
bad in the same absolute way. And for this reason, it 
opposes the above named maxim. 

But modern Christianity, modern civilization, has prac- 
tically long done away with this faith. It does indeed call 
the soul the likeness of God and the body a putrid 
food for worms; but its deeds prove that it does not 
take its religious phrases seriously. It cares little for 
the better part of man and directs all its thoughts and 
actions toward the satisfaction of the despised body. 
It employs science and art, and the products of all 
climates, for the glorification of the body, clothing it 
sumptuously, feeding it luxuriously, caring for it ten- 
derly, resting it on soft cushions. Although they 
speak slightingly of this earthly life in comparison to 
the eternal life beyond, yet in practice they cling for 
six days of the week to the uninterrupted pleasures of 
this body, while heaven is hardly considered worthy 
of careless attention for more than one short hour on 
Sundays. With the same thoughtless inconsistency 
the socalled Christian world also attacks our maxim 
with words, while in practical life it sanctifies the 
despised means by the end of its own welfare, going 
even so far as to demonstrate its inconsistency in its 
own life by subsidizing prostitution with state funds. 
The fact that the legislative bodies of our representa- 
tive states keep down the enemies of their bourgeois 
order by courtmartials and exile, that they justify this 
course by the proverb, "Do unto others as you would 



1G2 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

that they should do unto you," in the interest of "pub- 
lic" welfare, or that they defend their divorce codes by 
the plea of individual welfare, proves that the bour- 
geoisie also believes in the motto : The end sanctifies 
the means. And even though the citizens delegate 
rights to the state which they deny to themselves, also 
our opponents cannot but admit that in so doing the 
citizens are simply delegating their own rights to the 
superior authority of the state. 

True, whoever employs lying and cheating in the 
bourgeois world for the end of gaining wealth, even 
though he may make it one of his ends to give to 
charity, or whoever steals leather, like Saint Chispinus, 
for the purpose of making shoes for poor people, does 
not sanctify his means by his end, because the end in 
that case is not sanctified, or only nominally so, only 
in general, but not in the concrete case quoted. For 
charity is an end of but inferior holiness which must 
not be more than a means compared to the main end 
of maintaining bourgeois society, and whenever it 
contravenes this main purpose, charity loses its char- 
acter of a good end. And we have already seen that 
an end which is sanctified only under certain circum- 
stances cannot sanctify its means beyond them. The 
indispensable condition of all good ends is that they 
must be subservient to human welfare, and whether 
this welfare is secured by Christian or pagan, by 
feudal or bourgeois means, it always demands that the 
things which are considered unessential and of lesser 
importance should be subordinated to the essential 
and necessary things, while in the above quoted cases 
the more salutary honesty and bourgeois respecta- 
bility would be sacrificed to the less salutary charity. 



"practical reason" or morality 163 

"The end sanctifies the means" signifies in other 
words that in ethics as well as in economics, the profit 
must justify the investment of the capital. Again, if 
we call the forcible conversion of infidels a good end, and 
an arbitrary police measure a bad means, this does not 
prove anything against the truth of the maxim, but 
only testifies to its wrong application. The means is 
not sanctified in the case, because the end. is not, be- 
cause a forced conversion is not a good end, but rather 
an evil one resulting in hypocrisy, and because such 
a conversion does not deserve this name, or because 
force is a means which is unworthy of this term. If 
it is true that a forcible conversion or wooden iron 
are senseless ideas, how is it that people will persist 
in fighting against universally recognized truths with 
such inconsistencies, such inane word plays, such 
tricks of rhetoric and sophistry? The means of the 
Jesuits, sly tricks and intrigues, poison and murder, 
appear unholy to us only because the Jesuitic purpose, 
for instance that of extending the wealth and influ- 
ence and glorifying power of the order, is an inferior 
end which may make use of the innocent language of 
the pulpit, but is not an absolutely sanctified end, no 
supreme end, to which we would grant means that 
would deprive us of some essential end, for instance of 
our personal and public safety. Murder and man- 
slaughter are considered immoral as individual actions 
because they are not means to accomplish our main 
end, because we incline not toward revenge or blood- 
thirstiness, nor toward arbitrariness and the wilful 
dispensation of justice by some judge, but toward 
lawful decisions and the more or less impartial decrees 
of the state. But do we not explicitly declare in favor 



164 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

of the maxim "The end sanctifies the means," when 
we constitute ourselves into juries and render dan- 
gerous criminals powerless by the rope and the ax of 
the executioner? 

The same people who boast of having dropped 
Aristotle, that is to say the belief in authority, for 
centuries, and who therefore replaced the dead tradi- 
tional truth by living self-gained truth, are found 
to be completely at odds with their own development 
in the above cited cases. If we listen to the recital of 
some funny story, which may be told by even a relia- 
ble witness, we nevertheless remain loyal to the prin- 
ciples of free reason, that is to say we are free to re- 
gard as serious and regrettable any incident which the 
narrator may consider funny and ridiculous. People 
know how to distinguish between a story and the sub- 
jective impression its incidents created on the mind 
of the narrator, and which depends more on the per- 
sonality of the witness than on the actual facts. But 
in the matter of good ends and bad means it is pro- 
posed to neglect the distinction betwen an object and 
its subjective end which is otherwise the point of all 
critique. Such ends as charity, the conversion of infi- 
dels, etc., are thoughtlessly, a priori, called good and 
holy, because they once were so under particular con- 
ditions, while now their effect in the cases above cited 
is just the opposite, and then people wonder that the 
unrighteous title carries with it unrighteous priv- 
ileges. 

Only that end is worthy of the predicate good or 
holy in practice which is itself a means, a servant, of 
the end of all purposes, of welfare. Whenever man 
seeks his welfare in bourgeois life, in production and 



PRACTICAL REASON^ OR MORALITY 165 

commerce of commodities, and in the undisturbed en- 
joyment of his private property, he clips his long fingers 
by the commandment: "Thou shalt not steal." But 
wherever, as among the Spartans, war is regarded as 
the supreme end and craftiness as a necessary quality 
of a warrior, there thieving is used as a means of 
acquiring craftiness and sanctioned as a means for the 
main end. To blame the Spartan for being a warrior 
instead of a sedate bourgeois would be to ignore the 
facts of reality, would be equivalent to overlooking 
that our brain is not designed to substitute imaginary 
pictures for the actual conditions of the world, but is 
organized to understand that a period, a nation, an 
individual is always that which it can and must be 
under given circumstances. 

It is not from mere individual and unpraiseworthy 
fondness for the paradox that we subvert current 
views by defending the maxim "The end sanctifies the 
means," but from a consistent application of the 
science of philosophy. Philosophy originated out of 
the belief in a dualist contrast between God and the 
world, between body and soul, between the flesh and 
the spirit, between brain and senses, between thinking 
and being, between the general and the concrete. The 
conciliation of this contrast represents the end, or the 
aggregate result, of philosophical research. Philos- 
ophy found its dissolution in the understanding that 
the divine is worldly and the worldly divine, that the 
soul is related to the body, the spirit to the flesh, 
thinking to being, the intellect to the senses, in the 
same way in which the unity is related to the multi- 
plicity or the general to the concrete. Philosophy 
began with the erroneous supposition that the one, as 



166 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

the first thing, was the basis on which developed the 
two, three, four, and the entire multiplicity of things 
by succession. It has now arrived at the understand- 
ing that truth, or reality, turns this supposition upside 
down, that the reality with its multiplicity of forms, 
perceivable by the senses, is the first and foremost 
thing out of which the human brain gradually derived 
the conception of unity or generality. 

No achievement of science can be compared with 
the amount of talent and intellectual energy con- 
sumed in harvesting this one little fruit from the field of 
speculative philosophy. But neither does any ' scientific 
novelty encounter so many deep-rooted obstacles to its 
recognition. All brains unfamiliar with the outcome of 
philosophy are dominated by the old belief in the reality of 
some genuine, true, absolutely universal panacea, the dis- 
covery of which would make all sham, false individual 
panaceas impossible. But we, on the other hand, have 
been taught by the understanding of the thought 
process that this coveted panacea is a product of the 
brain and that, since it is supposed to be a general and 
abstract panacea, it cannot be any real, perceptible, 
concrete panacea. In the belief in an absolute difference 
between true and false welfare, there is manifested 
an ignorance of the actual operations of brain work. 
Pythagoras made numbers the basis of things. If this . 
Grecian philosopher could have realized that this 
basic nature was a thing of the mind, of the intellect,* 
and that numbers were the basis of reason, the com- 
mon or abstract content of all intellectual activity, 
then we should have been spared all the disputes 

*Which was gained by the mind's contact with its sense-perceived 
multiplicity of the world.— Editor. 



'PRACTICAL REASON" OR MORALITY 167 

which have raged around the various forms of abso- 
lute truth, about "things in themselves." 

Space and time are the general forms of reality, 
or reality exists in time and space. Consequently all 
real welfare must be attached to space and time, and 
every welfare which exists in these dimensions must 
be real. The different welfares, in so far as their 
beneficent qualities are concerned, are to be distin- 
guished only by their height and breadth, by the 
quantity of their dimensions, by their numeral rela- 
tions. Every welfare, whether true or seeming, is 
perceived by the senses, by practices of life, riot by 
abstract reason. But practice assigns the most con- 
tradictory things to different people at different times 
as means to their welfare. What is welfare in one 
place, is disaster in another, and vice versa. Under- 
standing, or reason, has nothing else to do in the mat- 
ter than to number these various welfares as they are 
made real by sense perceptions in various persons and 
times, and degrees of intensity, in the order in which 
they appear, and thus to distinguish the small from 
the great, the essential from the unessential, the con- 
crete from the general. Reason cannot dictate to us 
autocratically in matters of some absolutely true wel- 
fare, it can only indicate the most frequent, most 
essential, and most universal welfare in a certain per- 
ceived number of welfares. But it must not be for- 
gotten that the truth of such an understanding, or 
enumeration, depends on certain definite premises. 
It is therefore a vain endeavor to search for the true 
and absolute welfare. This search becomes practical 
and successful only when it limits itself to the under- 
standing of a definite amount of welfare of some par- 



168 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

ticular objects. The general welfare can be found 
only within definite boundaries. But the various de- 
terminations of welfare agree in this respect, that they 
all consider it well to sacrifice the little for the great, 
the unessential for the essential, and not vice versa. 
In so far as this principle is right, it is also right for 
us to employ for the good end of a great welfare some 
small means in the shape of a small evil and to endure 
it, and thus we see once more that the end sanctifies 
the means. 

If people were liberal enough to permit every one 
to go to heaven in his or her own way, the opponents 
of our maxim would be easily convinced of its truth. 
But instead of doing this, people follow the usual 
course of shortsightedness and make their private 
standpoint a universal one. They call their own pri- 
vate welfare the only true welfare, and regard the wel- 
fare of other nations, times and conditions a mistake. 
So does every school of art declare its own subjective 
taste to be objective beauty, ignoring the fact that 
unity is but a matter of ideas, of thought, while reality 
is full of the most varied forms. The real welfare is 
manifold and the true welfare but a subjective choice 
which, like a funny story, may make an entirely differ- 
ent impression on others, and be a false welfare. Even 
though Kant, or Fichte, or some other particular phil- 
osopher, may discuss at length the purpose of man- 
kind and solve the problem to his full satisfaction and 
to that of his audience, we nevertheless have learned 
enough today to know that one can define one's own 
personal idea of the purpose of mankind by means of 
abstract speculation, but that one cannot discover any 
unknown and hidden object in this way. Thought, or 



"practical reason" or morality 169 

reason, requires some object, and its work is that of 
measuring, of criticising. It may distinguish between 
true and false welfare, but will also remember that 
they have their limits, remember that it is itself per- 
sonal and that its distinctions are likewise personal 
and cannot be generalized beyond the point where 
others receive the same impression of the same object. 

Humanity is an idea, while man is always some 
special person who has his or her peculiar life in a 
definite environment and is therefore subservient to 
general principles only from motives of self-interest. 
The sacrifice of ethics, like that of religion, is only 
seemingly a self-denial and serves the ends of reason- 
able self-interest, an expenditure with a view to 
greater gains. A morality worthy of that name which 
is not better defined by the term obedience can be 
exercised only through the understanding of its 
worth, of its value for our welfare, of its usefulness. 
The variety of political parties is conditioned on the 
varieties of the interests concerned, and the difference 
in the means is conditioned on the difference in ends. 
In- questions of less importance even the champions 
of absolute morality testify to this fact. 

Thiers in his history of the French Revolution tells 
of a peculiar situation in the year 1796, when the 
patriots held the public power and the royalists car- 
ried on a revolutionary propaganda. It was then that 
the partisans of the revolution, who should have been 
the champions of unlimited liberty, demanded coercive 
measures, while the opposition, who secretly cared 
more for a monarchy than for a republic, voted for 
unlimited liberty. "To such an extent are parties 
governed by their self-interests," comments Thiers, 



170 THE NATURE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

just as if this were an anomaly instead of being the 
natural, necessary and inevitable course of the world. 
When, on the other hand, it is a question of the funda- 
mental laws of bourgeois order, then the moral repre- 
sentatives of the ruling classes are egotistic enough to 
deny the connection of their material interests with 
these laws and to claim that theirs are eternal, meta- 
physical world laws, that the pillars of their special 
class rule are the eternal pillars of humanity, and that 
their own means alone are holy ones and their end the 
final end of the universe. 

It is a disastrous deception, a robbing of human 
liberty, an attempt to cause the stagnation of the his- 
torical development, if any age or class thus proclaims 
its own peculiar purposes and means to be for the 
absolute welfare of humanity. Morality originally re- 
flects one's interests just as fashion reflects one's taste, 
and finally the action is moulded after the conceived 
pattern like the coat in dressing. In this process, force 
naturally is exerted for the maintenance and protec- 
tion of one's own life and those who resist are sub- 
dued. Interest and duty, though perhaps not entirely 
synonymous, are certainly closely related. Both of 
them are merged in the term welfare. Self-interest 
represents more nearly the concrete, immediate, tan- 
gible welfare, while duty concerns itself with the more 
remote and general welfare of the future also. While 
self-interest considers the present tangible metallic 
welfare of the purse, duty demands that we keep not 
only a part of welfare, but all welfare in mind, that 
we consider the future as well as the present, that we 
remember the spiritual welfare as well as the physical. 
Duty thinks also of the heart, of social needs, of the 



PRACTICAL REASON" OR MORALITY 171 

future, of the spiritual weal, in brief of interest in gen- 
eral and urges us to renounce the superfluous in order 
to secure and retain the necessary. Thus your duty is 
your self-interest and your self-interest your duty. 

If our ideas are to adapt themselves to truth, or to 
reality, instead of reality or truth adapting itself to 
our notions or thoughts, we must understand that the 
mutability of that which is right, holy, moral, is a 
natural, necessary and true fact. And we must grant 
to an individual the theoretical freedom which can- 
not be taken from it in practice, we must admit that 
it is as free now as it has ever been, that laws must 
be adapted to the needs of the social individual and 
not to the vague, unreal, and impossible abstractions, 
such as justice or morality. What is justice? The 
embodiment of all that is considered right, an indi- 
vidual conception, which assumes different forms in 
different persons. In reality only individual, definite, 
concrete rights exist, and man simply comes along 
and abstracts from them the idea of justice, just as he 
abstracted from different kinds of wood the concep- 
tion of wood in general, or from material things the 
conception of matter. It is just as far from the truth, 
to think thatS material things consist of, or are by 
virtue of, abstract matter, although this view is widely 
spread, as it is to believe that the moral or bourgeois 
laws were derived from the idea of justice. 

The ethical loss caused by our realistic, or if you 
prefer, materialistic, conception of morality is not so 
great as it appears. We need not fear that through 
this conception social beings will become lawless can- 
nibals or hermits. Freedom and lawfulness are 
closely allied by the need for association which com- 



172 THE VALUE OF HUMAN BRAIN WORK 

pels us to permit others to live together with us. If 
a man is prevented by his conscience or by other spir- 
itualistic or bourgeois ethics from committing unlaw- 
ful actions — unlawful in the wider meaning of the 
term — he is either not exposed to very grave tempta- 
tions, or he has a nature so tame that the natural or 
legal punishments fully suffice to- keep him within pre- 
scribed bounds. But where these checks are ineffec- 
tive, morality is likewise powerless. If it were other- 
wise, we should have to assume that morality exerts 
in secret the same influence on the faithful which is 
exerted by public opinion on the faithless. But we 
know from actual experience that there are more pious 
thieves than infidel robbers. That the world, which 
attributes so much value for social welfare to morality 
by word of mouth, actually shares this view of ours, 
is proven by the fact that bourgeois society gives more 
attention to the penal code and to the police than to 
the influence of morality. 

Moreover, our fight is not directed against mor- 
ality, not even against any special form of it, but only 
against the arrogance which assumes to stamp some 
concrete form of morality with the trade mark of 
absolute morality. We recognize that morality is 
eternally sacred, in so far as it refers to considerations 
which a man owes to himself and to his fellowmen in 
the interest of their common welfare. But the free- 
dom of the individual demands that each one should 
be at liberty to determine the degree of consideration 
and the manner of giving it expression. Under these 
circumstances it is as inevitable that the ruling pow- 
ers, classes or majorities should enforce their special 
needs under the form of a prescribed right, as it is that 



"practical beason" or morality 173 

a man's shirt should be closer to his skin than his coat. 
But it appears to us not merely very superfluous, but 
even detrimental to the energies required for the prog- 
ress of the future, that some decreed right should be 
elevated to the position of absolute right and trans- 
formed into an insuperable barrier to the advance of 
humanity. 



Letters on Logic 

Especially Democratic-Proletarian Logic 

BY JOSEPH DIETZGEN 

Translated by Ernest Untermann 



Editorial Remark. 

The "Letters on Logic/' treating on the same sub- 
jects as "The Positive Outcome of Philosophy," were 
intended by the author to.be replaced by this subse- 
quent work. 

We publish, however, both these works in hopes 
that the reader will pardon the frequent repetitions on 
account of the additional light that other parts of the 
"Letters on Logic" are apt to impart. 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 

FIRST LETTER 

Dear Eugene : 

You have now reached the age at which the stu- 
dents go to the university. There, according to cus- 
tom, they register first of all for a course in logic, 
whether they choose the study of law, medicine, or 
theology. Logic is, so to say, the elementary study in 
all branches of learning. Now you know, my dear, 
that school and life are regarded as two separate 
things. I should like to call your attention to their 
connection. We live also in school, we are schooled 
also by life. I should like to consider your trip across 
the Atlantic ocean as your first venture in the high 
school of life, and assume the role of your professor 
of logic. 

I feel well qualified for this office. Although-I am 
not well up in Latin and Greek, still I feel competent 
to guide you to the depths of logical science better 
than a German professor trained and installed accord- 
ing to the most approved pattern. You will admit the 
possibility of such a thing. For one who knows little 
may explain that little with more ease and efficac} 
than one who has his head stuffed full of the pre- 
scribed bunch of official wisdom. 

You, my son, have been so fortunate as to' enjoy 
a seven years' course in a German college. And since 

177 



178 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

your teachers, at your departure, gave you the highest 
certificate, I may well consider you as qualified not 
only to enter the school of life in the United States, 
but also to listen intelligently to my lectures on logic. 

But in order that my well trained pupil may not 
look down upon his self-taught teacher, I appeal to 
the fact that even the man with the best all-around 
education will be a tyro in specialties ; and that, on the 
other hand, ignorance in many things does not ex- 
clude the possibility of knowing more about a certain 
specialty than science has heretofore grasped. Now 
I claim in this case to have acquired a knowledge of 
the subject with which I intend to deal here that sur- 
passes anything I have been able to find in the pro- 
fessional literature. I mention this, my dear Eugene, 
with all due modesty, not for the purpose of throwing 
a halo around my personality, but in order to give a 
certain authority to my office as teacher and to inspire 
my pupil with confidence. 

Yes, I value confidence. Although you know me 
as a democrat who cares nothing for authority, you 
shall also learn to know me as a graduate in dialectics 
who, though he may empty the bath, still retains his 
hold on the child and does not permit it to float off 
with the water. Children, and one may say nations in 
their childhood, cannot do without authority, and a 
teacher, whether he instruct children or nations, can- 
not dispense with a certain confidence-inspiring air. 
The pupil must believe in the wisdom of his teacher, 
in order that he may approach the master with the 
necessary attention and willingness to learn. Later 
on the understanding of the subject makes all author- 
ity superfluous. Thus a thing so Sublime as author- 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 179 

ity is subject to the destructive tendencies of time, to 
the historical process. 

Hitherto mankind has often been tempted by pre- 
conceived notions to idolize vain things. It has been 
attempted to shield not only authority in general, but, 
what is still worse, this or that throne or altar, against 
the attacks of time. The relation between the perish- 
able and the imperishable has always been subject to 
much misunderstanding. Now since logic is that 
science which aims to set the intellect aright, we shall 
have to touch occasionally on the general misconcep- 
tion of time and eternity. 

The most famous expounders of logic are re- 
proached for their cumbrous style and their obscure 
mode of explanation. Even masters of languages 
have complained in my hearing about the foreign 
terms used by that branch of science, terms which 
even they could not understand. Much of the blame 
for this condition of things may fall on the difficulties 
of the subject, which have baffled all elucidation for 
thousands of years. Some of the blame also falls on 
the bad habit of using learned vernacular. But the 
greatest fault lies with the mental laziness of the stu- 
dents. Nothing can be learned without mental exer- 
tion. If you are concerned in your further develop- 
ment, you will recognize the Christian word- as to the 
curse of work as untrue. Work cannot be descended 
from sin, for it is a blessing. You will have experi- 
enced in yourself how elated one feels after successful 
physical or mental work. 

The things which science yields without exertion 
can be at most axiomatic commonplaces. 

I assume that you are quite willing to perform the 



180 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

necessary mental labor, and I promise you that I shall 
do my best to make this study easy for you. I do this 
so much more readily, as I frankly confess that these 
letters to my son are written with the intention of 
making them accessible to a wider circle of readers by 
means of the press. 

Before concluding, let me say a word about my 
aim of speaking especially of democratic-proletarian 
logic. You will think or say : Logic may be a subject 
worthy of study, but a special democratic-proletarian 
logic can surely treat of nothing but party matters. 
But just as the special accomplishments in this or 
that line, the special advances of this or that nation, 
are at the same time general advances, progress of 
civilization, so the ideas of proletarian logic are not 
party ideas, but conclusions of logic in general. You 
may reply: Even though the special thought of a 
Chinaman may be quite consistent and logical, still we 
would not call it Chinese logic. That would be quite 
true, but it does not meet my point. 

The thought on which the proletarian demands are 
based, the idea of the equality of all human beings, 
this ultimate proletarian idea, if I may say so, is fully 
hacked up by the deeper insight into the tortuous 
problem of logic. Now, since this idea dominates 
mankind, it certainly has more right than any Chinese 
idea. Furthermore, industrial development has lev- 
eled, simplified, cleared all social conditions to such an 
extent that it becomes ever easier to penetrate with 
sober eyes into the secrets of logic. Finally, my logic 
deserves its proletarian qualification for the reason 
that it requires for its understanding the overcoming 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 181 

of all prejudices by which the capitalist world is held 
together. 

The cause of the people is not a party matter, but 
the general object of all science. 

The people's cause as the ultimate object, and logic 
as the most elementary and most abstract science, as 
ultimate science, are as intimately connected as plants 
and botany, or as laws and the legal profession. So 
are the interests of democracy and the proletariat in- 
timately connected. The fact that this has not been 
well recognized in the United States so far, is more a 
proof of the lucky condition of that country than of 
the scientific knowledge of its democracy. The 
spreading primeval forests and prairies offered in- 
numerable homesteads to the poor and they obscured 
the antagonism between capitalists and wage workers, be- 
tween capitalist and proletarian democracy. But you 
still lack the knowledge of proletarian economics which 
would enable you to recognize without a doubt that 
it is precisely on the republican ground of America 
that capitalism makes giant strides and reveals ever 
more clearly its twofold task of first enslaving the 
people for the purpose of freeing them in due time. 



SECOND LETTER 

Dear Eugene : 

Having written the first letter by way of introduc- 
tion, I now am ready for a gradual approach to my 
subject. 

Logic aims to instruct the human mind as to its 
own nature and processes ; it will lay bare the interior 
working of our mind for our guidance. The object of 



182 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

the study of logic is thought, its nature, and its propel" 
classification. 

The human brain performs the function of think- 
ing as involuntarily as the chest the function of 
breathing. However, we can, by our will, stop breath- 
ing for a while, and accelerate or retard the breathing 
movements. In the same way, the will can control 
the thoughts. We may choose any object as the sub- 
ject matter of our thought, and yet we may quickly 
convince ourselves that the power of our will and the 
freedom of the mind are not any greater than the free- 
dom of the chest in breathing. 

While logic undertakes to assign the proper posi- 
tion to our brain, still it has to remember that nature 
has already assigned that position. 

It is with logic as it is with other sciences. They 
draw wisdom from the mysterious source of plain ex- 
perience. Agriculture, e. g., aims to teach the farmer 
how to cultivate the soil ; but fields were tilled long 
before any agricultural college had begun its lectures. 
In the same way human beings think without ever 
having heard of logic. But by practice they improve 
their innate faculty of thought, they make progress, 
they gradually learn to make better use of it. Finally, 
just as the farmer arrives at the science of agriculture, 
so the thinker arrives at logic, acquires a clear con- 
sciousness of his faculty of thought and a professional 
dexterity in applying it. 

I have two purposes in mind in saying this. 
Firstly, you must not expect too much from this 
science, for you cannot set contrary brains to rights 
by any logic. Secondly, you must not think too little 
of it, by regarding the matter as mere scholastic word- 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 183 

tnongery and useless hairsplitting. In daily life, as 
well as in all sciences, we never operate without the 
help of thought, but only with it, hence an under- 
standing of the nature of the processes of thought is 
of eminent value. 

Logic has its history like all sciences. Aristotle, 
whom Marx calls the "Grecian giant of thought," is 
universally recognized as its founder. 

After the classic culture of antiquity had been 
buried by barbarism, the name of Bacon of Verulam 
rose with the beginning of modern times as a philo- 
sophical light of the first order. His most famous 
work is entitled "Novum Organon." By the new 
organ he meant a new method of research which 
should be founded on experience, instead of the sub- 
tleties of the purely introspective method hitherto in 
vogue. After him, Descartes, or Cartesius, as he 
called himself in literature, wrote his still famous 
work, "About Methods." I furthermore recall Im- 
manuel Kant's "Critique of Reason," Johann Gottlieb 
Fichte's "Theory of Science," and finally Hegel, of 
whom the biographer said that he was as famous in 
the scientific world as Napoleon in the political. 

Hegel calls his chief work "Logic," and bases his whole 
system on the "dialectic method." You have only to 
look at the titles of these philosophical masterpieces 
in order to recognize that they all treat of the same 
subject which we are making our special study, viz., 
the light of understanding. The great philosophers of 
all times have searched for the true method, the 
method of truth, for the way in which understanding 
and reason arrive at science. 

I merely wish to indicate that this subject has its 



184 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

famous history, but I do not care to enter more deeply 
into it. I will not speak of the oppression and perse- 
cution, which was inaugurated by religious fanati- 
cism. I will not enumerate the various events that led 
to a greater and greater light from generation to gen- 
eration. The attempt to trace this history would en- 
tangle us in many disputed questions and errors 
which would only increase the difficulties of this study 
for the beginner. 

If a teacher of technology were to instruct you on 
steam engines and, to explain their first incomplete in- 
vention, trace their further development historically 
from improvement to improvement, until he should 
arrive at the height of perfection attained in their 
present day construction, he would also be advancing on 
a path, but on a tedious one. I shall endeavor 
to show my subject at the outset in the very clearest 
light which has ever been thrown on it by the help of 
the nations of all times. If I succeed in this, it will be 
easy in the future, in the reading of any author, to 
separate the, chaff from the wheat. 

I can afford to dispense with quotations and proofs 
from others in trying to make my case and demon- 
strating the positive product of social culture, for we 
are dealing with the most universal and omnipresent 
object, — one which enters into every spoken or writ- 
ten sentence with its own body. If anybody tells of 
far off times or v/onderful things, he must quote wit- 
nesses. Now, much of what I have to say for my case 
may sound wonderful, because it runs counter to the 
popular prejudice, but the only witness required to 
prove the truth of my statements is the clear brain of 
my pupil, who has only to examine his own experience 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 185 

without preconceived notions, in order to find proofs 
on every hand. 

It is surprising- in the first place, that such a near 
at hand object has not been understood long ago and 
that so much still remains to be explained and to be 
taught after thousands of years of study. But you 
know that just as the small things are often great, and 
great things small, so the nearest things are often 
hidden and the hidden things nearest. 

I promised you in the first sentences of this letter, 
dear Eugene, that I would now pass from introduction 
to subject matter. But since I have really continued 
to move around the outer edge of the subject instead 
of entering into its midst, you might become im- 
patient, and so I will justify my method. It is a pecu- 
liarity of this subject matter that it exposes me to this 
charge. It is a peculiarity of thought that it never 
stays with itself, but always digresses to other things. 
The thought is the plank to which I should stick, but 
it is the nature of this plank never to stick. Thinking 
is a thing full of contradictions, a dialectical secret. 

Now I know that here I am saying something 
which it is very hard for you to understand. But look 
here, has it not always been so? When you began 
declining Latin words in the sixth class, you were un- 
able at once to grasp the full meaning of declension. 
You knew what yon were doing, and yet you did not 
entirely understand it. Only after penetrating more 
deeply into the construction of the language did the 
meaning and purpose of the beginning become clear 
to you. In the same way, you now must try to digest 
as much as you can of what I say, and after you have 
gone more deeply into this matter, you will fully 



186 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

understand me from beginning to end. In taking les- 
sons from an author, on an unknown subject, I have 
always followed the method of first getting a super- 
ficial view of the subject, of glancing over its many- 
pages and chapters, in order to return to the begin- 
ning and acquire a thorough knowledge by repeated 
study. With the growing familiarity with the subject 
the ability to understand it grew, and at the conclu- 
sion the thing became clear to me. This is the only 
correct method I can recommend to you. 

In conclusion let me say for to-day in passing that 
the recommendation of the correct method for study- 
ing logic is not only an introduction, but, as I have al- 
ready said, the subject matter of science itself. 



THIRD LETTER 



Dear Eugene: 

My task of teaching logic requires two things: a 
logician and a teacher. 

The last named capacity requires that I should 
clothe the subject in an attractive way. Permit me, 
therefore, to combine the didactic style with that of the 
story teller, and to relate at this point an episode from 
a novel of Gustav zu Putlitz : 

The organist of a certain village is lying on his 
deathbed. His last strength has been spent on the 
previous day in playing a hymn, and after its conclu- 
sion he was carried from the church in an unconscious 
state. He had played his masterpiece, but at the same 
time his last piece. A despised stage girl had accom- 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 187 

panied him with a voice like that of a nightingale. 
But neither she nor the organ player had earned any 
applause from the stupid villagers. 

The old man looked around in his room, his eyes 
were first riveted on his faithful piano, his friend and 
companion through life. He extended his hand, but it 
sank down exhausted. He had not had the inten- 
tion to touch the piano anyway. It was only like 
stretching out one's hand for a friend far away. Then 
he looked through the window trying to recollect 
what time of the day it was. And when he had taken 
in the situation, he turned to the girl kneeling at his 
feet. 

"Poor child," he began, "you were deeply disap- 
pointed yesterday. I felt very much hurt, when I first 
heard of it, but after that everything became clear to 
me while I heard the music all night, until a short 
while ago. Rejoice, my girl, at being reviled, for it 
is done for the sake of that sacred music, and it is an 
ecstasy, a blessing, to be martyred for jane's music which 
is well worth all injuries. I did not fare any better all 
my life, and if I thank God for all the good he has 
done me until this hour, I also thank him first and 
most fervently for the gift of music which he bestowed 
on the world, and which he revealed to me most won- 
derfully in my most painful hours. 

"For my music I have starved and suffered all my 
life, and my gain was delicious, my reward celestial 
for this poor perishable stake. 

"My father was an organist in a little town of East- 
ern Frisia. His father had held the same position in 
the same church, and, I think, so did the father of his 
father follow music for a profession. Music has been 



188 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

the heirloom of our family for generations. True, it 
was the only heirloom, but I have cherished it and 
held its flag aloft all my life. When God calls me 
away, I shall leave nothing behind but that old piano 
and the sheet music which I wrote myself, for in all 
other respects I have always been poor. I might have 
done differently, and my wife has often upbraided me 
for it, but she does not understand the blessing of 
music. I do not blame her for that, for it was not her 
fault that God closed her ear to music as he did the 
ears of many others. Poor people, how cold and dreary 
must be their lives when music does not scatter blos- 
soms in their path and bathe their temples in light. 
But there will come a time when their ears will be 
opened, and God will compensate them in heaven for 
what they missed here below. 

"We who love music have tasted a part of eternal 
bliss here below, for harmony which dissolves all 
chords is eternal life and its wings are fanning us in 
this terrestrial life 

"Do you see, I know it well, and no one besides me, 
how it is when the soul prepares to leave the perish- 
able body and enter the song of the spheres — 

"You do not understand me, my girl, but do not 
worry, you also will understand some day. I will only 
tell you this much, and it shall be a consolation to you 
when the world treats you roughly hereafter. All of 
us, whether rich or poor, whether reclining on soft 
silken cushions or on hard straw, all of us enter life 
with the celestial melodies in our hearts. The beating 
of time goes with us as long as we are breathing. It 
is the beating of the heart in our breast. We may seem 
to lose the melody, even the measured step of time 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 189 

seems to become confused by our passion, but in 
the blessed hours we always find our melody anew, 
and then we feel at home in the path of our life." 

Thus the old organist idolized his music. 

But it is not alone the harmony of music which 
has such a power over the mind. The harmony of col- 
ors, every art and science, has the same power. Even 
the most common craft, and the most prosaic of all 
prose, the chase after the dollar, may take possession 
of a man's soul and prostrate him in adoration before 
its idol. True, not every one is so sentimentally in- 
clined, and even the sentimentalist is so only in es- 
pecially sentimental moments. Furthermore it cannot 
be denied that artists, inventors, and explorers are 
worshipping the most worthy and most adorable ob- 
jects. And I admit that no great success can be ac- 
complished without putting your whole soul into some 
great aim. 

Nevertheless you should know that anything which 
may take possession of one's soul shares its sublimity 
with all other things, and is for this reason at the 
same time something ordinary. Without such a dia- 
lectic clarification of our consciousness all adoration 
is idol worship. 

The actual experience, then, that anything and 
everything may serve as an idol should clearly convince 
you that no one thing, but only the universe is the true 
God, is truth and life. 

Now, is this logic or is it theology? 

It is both. At closer range you will notice that all 
great logicians occupy themselves a great deal with 
God and deity, and that on the other hand all honest 



190 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

theologians are trying to base their faith on some logi- 
cal order. Logic is by its whole nature metaphysical.* 

There exists a class of logicians who attempt to 
deny the inevitable connection between the celestial 
region and the tangible universe. Some of them do so 
from excessive religious delicacy of feeling, in order 
to protect the sublime from the disintegrating effects 
of critique. Others have such an antipathy against 
the religious abuses that they do not wish to hear any 
more about religion. Both classes adhere to the so- 
called formal logic. 

These adherents of formal logic may be compared 
to a maker of porcelain dishes who would contend 
that he was simply paying attention to the form of his 
dishes, pots, and vases, but that he did not have any- 
thing to do with the raw material, while it is evident 
that he is compelled to form the body in trying to em- 
body forms. These things can be separated by words 
only, but not by actions. In the same way as body 
and form, the finite and infinite or so-called celestial 
spheres, the physical and the metaphysical, are in- 
separable. 

Logic analyzes thought. But it analyzes thought 
as it is in reality, and therefore it unavoidably searches 
for truth. And whether this truth is found above or 
below, or anywhere, is a question which just as inevit-. 
ably brings the logician into contact with the theo- 
logian. To think of avoiding such a meeting from con- 
siderations of sympathy or antipathy, would be a rude 
lack of consideration for science. 

Metaphysical logic which aims to extend its field 

-In the sense of: mental and physical world embracing, all- 
embracing. — Editor. 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 191 

to eternity, which looks for logical order even in 
heaven, and seeks to solve even the so-called last ques- 
tions of all knowledge, differs in a distinct way from for- 
mal logic, which selects a restricted field for its research 
and confines itself to investigating the logical order of 
the socalled physical world. This difference is worthy of 
your special attention, because in it there is hidden the 
kernel of our whole correspondence. 

It is quite a practical method to set a limit for one's 
investigations, not to fly into clouds, not to undertake 
anything that cannot be accomplished. Yet you must 
not forget that practical boundaries are not theoretical 
boundaries, that they are not invariable boundaries 
for you, or for others. Although you cannot fly to 
heaven and will give up the idea of flying machines 
from considerations of practical expediency, yet you 
will not wish to deny to man the theoretical freedom 
of infinite striving even in the matter of airships, and 
you will not be so small as to give up the idea of the 
capacity for our race for metaphysical, or in other 
words, infinite development. 



FOURTH LETTER 

Dear Eugene : 

In my first letter I acquainted you with my pur- 
pose, in the second I lifted the subject on my finger 
tips, so to say, to show it for a brief moment; in the 
third I showed that its color had inevitably a religious 
shade. Now, to continue, permit me to introduce an- 
otner point to your consideration. 

The great cause of the working class has hitherto 



192 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

always been the beast of burden of a small and exclu- 
sive minority. This is most evident in the slave states 
of antiquity, in Egypt, Greece, Rome. Likewise in the 
feudal and guild systems of the middle ages the op- 
pression of the mass of the people is sufficiently ap- 
parent. At present this condition of things is more 
visible in Eastern Europe, in Russia, Turkey, Bulgaria, 
Hungary, Eastern Prussia, etc., than in the industrial 
countries of the West. In the United States of 
America it is most obscured, so that there the people 
hardly realize their enslaved condition. In America, 
many of the upper ten thousand have made their way 
from the bottom up, and it happens more frequently 
than in Europe that the captains of industry laid their 
foundation by hard work. The shortsighted obser- 
vers then easily forget out of sympathy for the hard 
beginning that there is sharper's practice at the end, 
and they indulge in the idle hope that every hard work- 
ing beast of burden might transform itself into a happy 
millionaire by thrift and smartness. 

You will probably ask : What has that to do with 
logic or the art of reasoning ? Patience ! You will 
admit that the emancipation of the nations from beastly 
toil, misery and suffering is the highest goal of the 
human mind. Nor will you deny that the thought is 
the most essential instrument for reaching this high 
goal. The accomplishments of thought are visible in 
the results of civilization. The proletariat of the pres- 
ent, also that of Russia, Turkey, East Prussia, partici- 
pates in these accomplishments of thought. It par- 
ticipates not alone in the sense that its brains are better 
educated and cultured, but also that its food, clothing, 
and shelter have become more civilized through the 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 193 

progressive deeds of intellect. 

You see, then, that the people's cause is connected 
with the faculty of thought, and the nature of the latter 
may be illustrated as well by the example of the devel- 
opment of civilization. The complicated network 
of wheels in a watch may also serve to demonstrate 
the nature of that which language designates by many 
names, such as spirit, intellect, faculty of knowledge, 
reason, etc. Only it must be remembered that this 
mysterious something cannot be shown by itself, but 
only in connection with other things, whether they be 
the history of civilization or a watch. There will then 
be no contradiction in finding that the intellectual life 
appears more powerful and magnificent through the 
clockwork of the history of civilization than through 
any miniature product of thought. 

In searching for the connection of things, one gener- 
ally seeks to recognize the manner or the degree of 
the connection. But we, in this case, disregard the 
question as to how the things of this world are related 
to one another and to thought, and we simply make a 
note of the fact of the interdependence of thought and 
being, of nature and mind. This fact of the universal 
interconnection of things contradicts the untrained 
prejudice. The uncultivated brain nurses the illusion 
that the earth, the trees on it, and the clouds and the 
sun above them are separate things. But it requires 
a better training of reason to understand that the earth, 
the tree, the clouds, and the sun, can be what they are 
only in the universal interconnection. I remember 
reading an article from Fichte, in a German school 
reader, which clearly showed that the disarrangement 
of an insignificant object during the process of think- 



194 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

ing causes us to disarrange the whole history of the 
world in our thoughts. It is well known that one un- 
familiar with political economy overlooks the fact 
that the business men not only carry on their trading 
for their private benefit, but are also members of the 
process of social production. It is overlooked that all 
labor, aside from being individual activity, is at the 
same time an organic part of social labor. And just 
as ignorance of economics overlooks the industrial in- 
terdependence, so ignorance of logic overlooks the cos- 
mic interrelations. 

Here is a drop of water. Look how different it is 
according to the different things with which it is 
connected. It cannot be what it is without a certain 
temperature. According to changes in temperature, 
it will assume either the form of ice or of steam. In 
fat the drop remains compact, in salt it divides in- 
finitely, runs downhill in general and uphill in a loaf of 
sugar. According to the specific gravity of a certain 
fluid, with which it may come into contact, it either 
floats on the surface or sinks. Without a connection 
with the earth, its temperature and gravitation, this 
drop and all others would disappear in the fathomless 
abyss and have no existence. Thus the forms of things 
change according to their connections, and they are 
what they are only as parts of the universal interrela- 
tion. 

What is true of a drop of water, is true of all things, 
all forces and substances, even of our thoughts. The 
human mind lives and works only in connection with 
the rest of the material universe — and the recognition 
of the organic unity of all things is the fulcrum of my 
logic. 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 195 

Old line metaphysical logic was so enamored of its 
object that the descent, the kinship, and the connection 
with the common things of this world seemed too ordi- 
nary for the exquisite spirit. That logic was transcen- 
dental, and therefore its chosen object likewise had to 
be in touch with a transcendental world. And though 
it was scientific enough to regard the tale of the crea- 
tion of the first soul by the breath of God as a fable, 
it was nevertheless so prejudiced in favor of the extra- 
ordinary nature of the intellect that it did not abandon, 
for thousands of years, the hope of finding in that intel- 
lect a source which would reveal transcendental mat- 
ters. Formal logic now entirely discards this hope of a 
fantastical world, but at the same time it misunder- 
stands the natural connection between the spirit and 
the common world. It isolates the instrument of 
thought and leaves the question undecided whether 
this instrument has a natural, supernatural, or no con- 
nection at all. It overlooks that just as logic is real, 
so reality is logical, and does not see that the back door 
which leads to illogical heaven by way of faith deserves 
the disdain of science. 

Thought, intellect, are really existing, and their 
existence is a uniform part of the universal existence. 
That is the cardinal point of sober logic. 

The fact that the thoughts are of the same worldly 
substance as the other parts of the universe, that they 
are parts of common nature and not a transcendental 
essence, has already been expressed by Cartesius in 
the famous words : "Cogito, ergo sum," I think, there- 
fore I am. 

The fact of my thinking, says the philosopher, 
proves my existence. In order to come to an absolute 



196 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

conviction on the nature of truth and error, he sets out 
by doubting everything. And then he says that he 
cannot doubt the existence of his thoughts. He thus 
placed the spirit on the basis of real life, delivered it 
of its trancendentalism, and that constitutes his ever- 
lasting merit. 

However, not alone Cartesius, but also your own 
experience testifies to the inseparable connection be- 
tween thinking and being. Have not your thoughts 
been connected always and everywhere with some 
worldly or real object? If you attempt to isolate 
thought in order to ponder over it, you can only do so 
because that thought has been experienced by you and 
therefore was in every instance attached to some 
worldly object. True, you have thought of Greek 
gods, brownies, and mermaids. But you, an amateur in 
painting, are familiar enough with that part of the 
mind which is called imagination in order to admit 
that even this eccentric part of the mind does not only 
act, and therefore, exist in reality, but also derives all 
its products from reality, so that even its most fan- 
tastical vagaries and illusions are still real pictures, 
reflections of reality. 

But how is it that I require such a multitude of 
words in order to state over and over again that the 
thought has a real existence and is a uniform part 
of the universe? Simply because from time imme- 
morial the confusion in matters of logic is so great that 
the human spirit is in the same breath exalted to 
heaven, and yet its thoughts regarded as nothing real, 
nothing true. This is made plain by the fact that a 
sharp distinction is commonly made between that 
which is real and that which is only imagined, and this 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 197 

difference is exaggerated to such an extent that it ap- 
pears as if the idea, which indeed is only in the brain, 
has no real existence at all. 

In order that you may understand the interrelations 
of the things of the universe, I must warn you against 
this exaggeration and prove that the intellect has a real 
existence which is connected with the universe or 
reality. Botany, which occupies itself with plants, 
does not only teach us to divide them into classes, 
orders, and families, but it also does more by showing 
us what place in the entire realm of nature is occupied 
by the vegetable kingdom, by pointing out the differ- 
ences which distinguish the plants from the inorganic 
mineral kingdom or the organic animal kingdom. 
Formal logic similarly dissects the spirit into its parts, 
makes distinctions between conceptions, ideas, judg- 
ments, conclusions, divides these into subdivisions, 
classifies conceptions according to species, separates 
abstract and concrete thought, knows many varieties 
of judgments, registers three, four, or more modes 
of conclusion. But at the same time this formal 
logic recoils from touching on the question as to how 
the universal spirit is related to the universe, what role 
it plays in the general existence, whether it is part and 
parcel of nature or transcendental. And yet this is 
the most interesting part, the part which logically con- 
nects the intellect and the science of the intellect with 
all other sciences and things. 

Logic must teach us how to distinguish. It is not 
a question, however, of distinguishing sheet iron from 
gold, or a greyhound from a pug-dog, for this is done 
by special lines of knowledge. Logic must rather en- 
lighten us about that part of the faculty of distinguish- 



198 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

ing which is generally required in all branches of 
knowledge, whereby truth and error, imagination and 
reality are recognized. To this end I feel impelled to 
advise you not to overlook that even error and imagi- 
nation belong to the one infinite and absolutely co- 
herent reality. For the purpose of distinguishing true 
imagination from actual reality, it must be remembered 
that just as rye bread and cream puffs agree in belong- 
ing to the general category of baker's products, so 
imagination and truth, thought and reality, are two 
different kinds of the same nature. 

To sum up the contents of this letter, let me point 
out that its beginning shows the connection of the intel- 
lect with the development of the people, while its conclu- 
sion explains the wider connection of the mind with the 
universal existence. 



FIFTH LETTER 



A man not trained in logical thinking is handicapped 
by the absence of a monistic method of thought. Mon- 
istic is synonymous with systematic, logical, or uniform. 

If we call a cream puff a tidbit and rye bread a food 
without remembering that every food is a tidbit and every 
tidbit food, and if we ignore the fact that both of them, in 
spite of their difference, belong to the same category 
and are, therefore, related, then we lack logic. And 
logic is lacking whenever the fact is ignored that all 
things without exception: substances, forces, or quali- 
■ ties of the world, are chips of the same block, finite 
parts of the infinite, which is the only truth and reality. 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 199 

That insects, fishes, birds, and mammals form one 
and the same animal kingdom, is an old story which has 
long been patched up by the logical instinct. Darwin 
did not only enrich the natural sciences, but also per- 
form an invaluable service for logic. In proving how 
amphibia developed into birds, he bored a hole into the 
hitherto fixed order of classification. He brought mo- 
tion, life, spirit into the zoological swamp. 

In case you should not be familiar enough with Dar- 
win's work to understand my allusions, I will enter a 
little more deeply into the matter in a few sentences. 
The zoologists knew well enough that all species of ani- 
mals belonged to the animal kingdom; but this classifi- 
cation was a mechanical affair. Now the "Origin of 
Species," which demonstrates that the zoological classi- 
fication is not constant but variable, which outlines the 
actual transition from one species of animals to another, 
reveals at the same time that this alignment of all ani- 
mal species in one kingdom is not only a logical mechan- 
ism, but also a fact of actual existence. This classifica- 
tion of all animals from the minutest to the most gigan- 
tic in one kingdom appeared before the time of Darwin 
as an order which had been accomplished by thought 
alone, while after him it was known as an order of na- 
ture. 

What the zoologists did to. the animal kingdom, 
must be done by the logician to existence in general, 
to the cosmos. It must be shown that the whole world, 
all forms of its existence, including the spirit, are logically 
or monistically connected, related, welded together. 

A certain narrow materialism thinks that everything 
is done and said when the inter-connection between 
thought and brain is pointed out. A good many things 



200 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

may still be discovered by the help of the dissecting knife, 
microscope, and experiment; but this does not make the 
function of logic superfluous. True, thought and brain 
are connected, just as intimately as the brain is related 
to the blood, the blood, with oxygen, etc. ; but moreover 
thought is connected quite as intimately with all other 
things as all physical objects are. 

That the apple is not alone dependent on the stem 
which attaches it to the tree, but also on sunshine and 
rain, that these things are not one-sidedly but univer- 
sally connected, this is what logic wants to teach you 
particularly in regard to the spirit, the thought. 

If a traveler in Africa had to report a new animal 
species, he would not make special mention of the fact 
of its existence, because that is obvious. And though 
he were to relate things about the most abnormal exist- 
ence, we should still know that this abnormality is only 
a deviation in degree which does not overstep the bounds 
of existence in general. But the human intellect is a 
greater novelty than the most wonderful animal species 
of the interior of Africa. 

You know my sharpwitted friend Englander. When 
I told him that I was writing articles on the human 
mind, he advised me not to bother my head about it. He 
said that this was a subject no man knew anything about. 
And when the learned Mr. Hinze, whom you also know, 
wanted to prove the inevitability of religious faith and 
the inadequacy of all science, he always asked the pa- 
thetic question: What is consciousness? And he used 
to take on an expression, as if he had presented a book 
with seven seals. Now I don't want to class the pro- 
fessors of logic with such men. But it is a fact that the 
great multitude, among them many scientists, are quite 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 201 

unfamiliar with the truth that the existence of the blue 
sky and of the green trees is a uniform part of the same 
generality with the existence of our intellect. 

For this reason it is necessary to prove that the in- 
tellect exists in the same way that all other things do. 
For it is denied and misunderstood, not only by those 
who regard the spirit as a being of a transcendental na- 
ture, but also by those who admit the existence of the true 
contents of an ideological concept, but not of thought 
itself. In short, the matter is so obscure that I feel sure 
that you will likewise be as yet in doubt whether there 
are not two kinds of ideological concepts, one of them 
real, the other unreal. 

For two thousand years logic has proclaimed the sen- 
tence that thought is a form to be filled with real contents. 
True thought "must coincide with reality." It is true 
that there is a germ of sense in this statement, but it 
is misunderstood. The central point of logic is over- 
looked. Every thought must not only have a real con- 
tent, but it is also necessary, in order to distinguish true 
thoughts or perceptions from untrue, to realize that 
thought is always and everywhere a part of reality and 
truth, even when it contains the most singular imagina- 
tions and errors. 

Just as the domestic cat and the panther are different 
species of cats and yet belong to the same genus of 
cats, so true and false thoughts, in spite of all their 
differences, are of the same genus. For truth is so 
great that it comprises absolutely everything. Truth, 
reality, the world, the all, the infinite and the absolute 
are synonymous expressions. A clear conception of 
truth is indispensable for the understanding of logic. 
And in the last analysis it is simply using different 



202 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

words for the same thing, when I base the quintessence 
of logic, its fulcrum, cardinal, salient, or distinctive 
point on the spirit intimately united to nature or on the 
concept of a uniform world, truth, or reality. I cannot 
give you a clearer view of truth than by quoting at this 
place the famous words of Lessing: "If God were to 
offer me the ever active striving for truth in his left 
hand and truth in his right hand, I should grasp his left 
and say: Father, keep truth, it is for you alone." This 
statement is somewhat highflown and mystical, and Les- 
sing was no doubt somewhat embarrassed by mystical 
thinking. Still there is a sober truth in these words, 
which is quite clear and to the point. 

"Truth itself" is the universe, the infinite and inex- 
haustible. Every part of it is a finite part of the infinite 
and is, therefore, finite and infinite, perishable and im- 
perishable at the same time. Every part is a separate 
part and connected inseparably with the whole. The 
human mind, among others, is such a part. 

The universal existence, or truth, is the inexhaust- 
ible object of the human mind. The fact that in the 
study of logic the human mind has itself for an object 
must be explained to the student by pointing out that 
in this case the subject and the object are both things 
like all other things, in other words, are a part of truth, 
a part of natural existence. 

"Truth itself" cannot be wholly conceived by the 
human brain, but in parts. For this reason we possess 
only the ever active striving for truth; for this reason, 
furthermore, the conception or knowledge can never be 
completely identical with reality, but can be only a part 
of it. "* 

Now permit me to say a few words which do not 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 203 

sound as would those spoken on the throne of logic, but 
which are expressed in popular language. If you con- 
ceive some real object, whether a church steeple or a 
thimble, then this object exists twice, viz., in reality and 
in conception. On the other hand, a certain creation of 
imagination has only a simple fantastical existence. 
Such a popular way of thinking is undoubtedly correct. 
It is incorrect only when the fact is universally ignored 
that all modes of existence belong to the same genus, 
the same as a domestic cat and a panther, so that the 
existence of a thing in our brains, and outside of them 
in the heavens, on earth, and in all places has a logical 
meaning only when it is the same existence in spite of all 
multiplicity. An existence not partaking of the general 
nature of all existence would be an illogical, nonsensical, 
thing. 

Now, I think you will have no difficulty in under- 
standing me when I say that a church steeple in imagi- 
nation and the same church steeple in reality are not two 
church steeples, but that imagination and reality are 
forms of the same existence. 

Ancient logic ordered a medal and had stamped on 
its face : The thought must be identical with the reality. 
We now stamp on its reverse side : ( 1 ) The thought 
is itself a part of reality and (2) the reality outside of 
thought is too voluminous and cannot enter thought even 
with its smallest particle. What good, under these cir- 
cumstances, is the old inscription, especially since it does 
not teach us at all how the identity between thought and 
its real object is to be attained, known, or measured? 

If you, my dear Eugene, should become confused by 
these statements instead of enlightened, you should have 
patience and consider that a thing which is to be illumi- 



204 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

nated by logic must, of course, be first obscure. I be- 
lieve that I have served you in some way by simply rais- 
ing a doubt in your mind as to the soundness of the 
popular way of speaking and if I thus have convinced 
you of the confusion and inadequacy o£ the plausible idea 
of the identity of thought and reality. 

True, a thought must agree with its object just as a 
portrait should. But what good will it do a painter to 
have his special attention called to this fact? 

Have you ever seen a portrait or a copy that did not 
agree in some respect with the original ? I am convinced 
that this has never been your experience any more than 
a portrait which was a complete likeness of its object. 
Your experience will be sufficiently cultivated to know 
that it can always be a question only of a more or less. 
I would seriously recommend to you to reflect on the 
relativeness of all equality, similarity, and identity. By 
far the greater part of humanity is in this respect bar- 
barously thoughtless. It is very difficult to grasp for 
the logically untrained brain that two drops of water 
or twins are only relatively alike or unlike, just as are 
man and woman, negro and white man, and that all ex- 
istence is just as alike as it is unlike. 

It is with the thinker as it is with the painter. They 
both search for a likeness of reality and truth. In 
painting as in understanding there are excellent pic- 
tures and bad ones. In this respect one may make a dis- 
tinction between true and false thoughts, but you must 
also know that even the unsuccessful portrait has some 
likeness, and that even the most accurate likeness is yet 
far from being in perfect harmony and identical with its 
object. 

Reality, truth, universal nature, stands in the pulpit 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 205 

and preaches: "I am the Lord, thy God. Thou shalt 
not make any graven image to worship it." You must 
have a far too sublime conception of truth to entertain 
the idea that any painter or thinker might encompass it 
fully within the limit of a picture, no matter how good a 
likeness it may be. 

Now, that we have recognized the human mind as a 
part of actual reality and truth, we see at the same time 
that undivided reality, the sum of all that is, represents 
absolute truth which comprises everything. In their ca- 
pacity of parts of the universe, true and false thoughts, 
good and bad men, heaven and hell, and all other things, 
are all pieces of the same cloth, bombs of the same 
caliber. 



SIXTH LETTER 

My Dear Son: 

After the third letter had acquainted you with the 
fact that the subject of logic has a certain religious 
flavor, the two subsequent letters endeavored to show 
that the logical subject is interconnected with the uni- 
versal existence of the world, that the faculty of thought 
is an inseparable part of actual truth. In the vernacular 
of theology my last two letters have represented the hu- 
man mind as a part of the living true God. 

Christianity teaches: God is a spirit and who would 
worship him must worship in spirit and in truth. 

And logic teaches : The spirit is a part of universal 
existence. Whoever worships the spirit, is an idolator, 
for he worships a part and misunderstands the whole 
truth. Truth itself is identical with the universal ex- 
istence, with the world, and all things are simply forms, 



206 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

phenomena, predicates, attributes, passing expressions 
of it. The universal existence may be called divine be- 
cause it is infinite, being the alpha and omega which 
comprises all things as special truths. The intellect is 
such a limited part among other special parts of divine 
truth, and the latter is frequently called world without 
any bombastic emphasis. 

Undoubtedly, every science, profession and trade can 
say the same thing of its object. The blue sky and the 
green trees are divine parts. Everything is interrelated 
and connected. If that were a good reason for not 
making any subdivisions, every part and description 
would become endlessly tiresome. 

However, the specialty of logic is the cosmic sum of 
all truths, because it aims at a general elucidation of 
the nature of the human brain. This purpose is not so 
well served by an accumulation of other knowledge as 
by the general understanding of truth. 

Logic, which seeks to enlighten the mind for the 
purpose of scientific thinking, does not so much treat of 
true conceptions as of the general and absolute concep- 
tion of truth which is inseparably linked to the infinite 
universal life. 

If you wish to think scientifically, you will first of all 
strive after clear ideas. And yet your head may be quite 
clear in regard to everyday things, without getting any 
nearer to general clearness. Nor is such clearness ob- 
tainable by the accumulation of mere special knowledge, 
for even if you were to grow in wisdom to the end of 
your days, nevertheless the fountain of wisdom, the uni- 
verse, is inexhaustible and your brain will remain im- 
perfectly informed or unclear as before Yea, even the 
smallest part of the world is so inexhaustible that the 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 207 

most talented can never acquire all the knowledge nec- 
essary to understand entirely even the most minute ob- 
ject. The strongest microscope cannot see all there is to 
see in a drop of water, and the wisest man can never 
learn all there is to shoemaking. 

Vou can see by all this that the scientific use of our 
intellect is furthered by special knowledge only in the 
corresponding details. For this reason it does not sat- 
isfy us to have some logicians tell us how many kinds 
of concepts, judgments and conclusions are contained in 
our intellect. These are special details of logic. But 
the thing of first importance for the student of logic is 
the elucidation of the universal concept of truth, not the 
accumulation of special truths. 

Special truths enlighten the intellect. But the un- 
derstanding that all specialties are connected with one 
another by one monad or unit which is truth itself gives 
us a certain general enlightenment which certainly does 
not render any special research unnecessary, or take the 
place of it, but which may well serve as the foundation 
of all research, which may therefore be called a funda- 
mental assistance. 

I may remark in passing that the understanding of 
logical science is rendered especially difficult by the fact 
that the unpracticed understands all terms and concepts 
only in their narrow popular meaning, while the subject 
matter leads up continually into the widest fields. 

When I speak of parts of the world, you must not 
think merely of geographical parts, but you must think 
farther until you arrive at the insight that stars and 
bricks, matter and force, in short all parts of the world 
are world parts. 

The logical difficulty may be principally traced to the 



208 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

lack of familiarity with trie comprehensive categories. 
It will be clear to you that thinking and being, phenom- 
enon and truth, etc., are conceptions of the widest scope. 
So you may have some difficulty in distinguishing be- 
tween concepts of truth, and true concepts. And yet 
this is the same as making a distinction between the 
general class of herbs and its individual species. The 
mere intercourse with such comprehensive concepts as 
truth, existence, universe, is an excellent school of in- 
tellectual enlightenment. 

Perhaps you may object to the deviation of a science 
devoted to the special study of the faculty of thought 
into such fields as existence or truth. But a logic con- 
fined to an analysis of the faculty of understanding 
would be narrow compared to one representing this fac- 
ulty of understanding at work in real life. If the science 
of the eye were to treat only of the various parts of the 
eye without considering the things outside connected 
with its function, the light, the objects, in short, the vis- 
ion of the eye, it would be more an anatomy of the eye 
than a general science of the eye. At all events a science 
which represents not alone the subjective faculty of 
vision, but also the living activity of the eye, the ob- 
jective field of vision inseparable from the subjective 
faculty, is a far more comprehensive instruction, a higher 
enlightenment of the human brain. 

In my opinion, logic should not so much treat of the 
analysis of the intellectual subject as of the purpose and 
object of the faculty of thought, its culture, which is not 
accomplished by the intellect itself, but by its connection 
with the world of truth, its interrelation with the uni- 
versal existence. 

What can a logic accomplish which divides thought 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 209 

into analytical and synthetical thoughts, which speaks of 
inductive and deductive understanding and of a dozen 
other kinds, but which finally declines to meet the ques- 
tion of the relation of thought and understanding to 
truth, and fails to indicate what and where is divine 
truth and how we may arrive at it? 

Pilate, the typical sceptic, shrugs his shoulders ; the 
clergymen make a mystery of divine truth; the natural 
sciences care only for the true conceptions, but naught 
for the concept of truth ; and then the special science of 
understanding, formal logic, tries to refer its task to 
philosophy or world wisdom. 

I have already pointed out that the titles of the prin- 
cipal works on philosophy indicate that the whole world 
wisdom turns around the question: How can our brain 
be enlightened, how can it arrive at truth? The natur- 
alists answer that this can be accomplished by special 
studies, and they are frequently opposed to philosophical 
research which makes general truth its main object, and 
belittle it. You will readily see that this is a mistake 
when you consider that, to illustrate, a machine or an or- 
ganism as a whole is still something more than a mere 
sum of its parts. 

No matter how well you may know each single part, 
yet you will not understand the whole machine or or- 
ganism by this means alone. The universe is not an ag- 
gregation of unorganized parts, but a living process 
which must be understood not only in its parts but also 
as a whole. We may pass for the moment the question 
whether the Milky Way may be dissolved into stars, 
and whether the stars may become globes like our Earth 
which may develop plants, animals, and intelligent be- 
ings. The thing which is evident is that there is a pro- 



210 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

cess of development, that all nature takes part in this 
movement, that the universe is a whole without end, 
composed of an infinite number of parts ; a coming and 
going, an eternal transformation, which is always identi- 
cal with itself and always the same world. What all 
this would be without our eyes and ears and without the 
intellect by means of which we use eyes and ears, what 
the world "in itself" is, that is a senseless and trans- 
cendental speculation. 

The science of logic must deal only with the actual 
world which is inseparable from us and froi*i our 
thoughts. 

This world which we hear, see, smell, in which we 
live and breathe, is the world of truth or the true world. 
That is a fact. Must I prove this? And how is a fact 
proven? How do we prove that a peach is a delicious 
fruit ? One goes and eats it. In the same way, you may 
now go and enjoy life, of course in a rational manner, 
and I am convinced that your own love of life will tell 
you that it is proof positive of the truth of the world, of 
its actuality. 

But even in the midst of this actual world there is 
present an inconsistent element, a human race with a 
confused logic. This race has been led by various de- 
pressing and saddening circumstances to blacken the 
delicious truth of this world and to look for a trans- 
cendental truth in philosophical metaphysics or religious 
fantasmagorias, both of which are parts of the same 
stew. The philosophers of misery who make of the 
world of truth a vain shadow.jand a miserable vale of 
sorrow must needs b.ejg^inced by logic that the living- 
world is the only truiflK^ 

Well, that is nfl B^aifficult. But there is a danger 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 211 

of getting into a vicious circle of errors, imitating a 
snake biting its own tail. I have to prove logically that 
the world and truth are one and the same thing, before 
we have come to an agreement as to what is logical 
truth or true logic. Nevertheless, nature has assisted us. 
The logic of nature is the true logic by the help of 
which we can agree. Nothing more is required than a 
somewhat trained brain. 

Take two men having a dispute about truth. One 
of them says it is one thing, the other that it is some- 
thing else. So they are arguing about that which is. 
This last word is a form of the verb to be. Hence in 
arguing whether the remote nebula in the heavens is a 
brick or a star, a male or a female, one is always dis- 
cussing some form of existence. All disputes turn 
around forms of existence, but existence itself is an un- 
disputable truth. 

Have I now still to prove that all existence is of the 
same category ? Are there any stones that do not belong 
to the category of stones, or any kind of wood which 
is iron? What would become of reason and language, 
if such a thing were to be considered? And yet, much 
that is being said by opponents is of such a nature. 

If I have succeeded in convincing you that the uni- 
verse is the truth, there still remains the special ques- 
tion: What place shall we assign to fantastic ideas, 
error, and untruth? If the universe is the truth, then 
everything would be true, and hence it seems contradic- 
tory that error and untruth should have a place in truth 
or in the world. Of this more anon. I .shall only point 
out in passing that untruth may without any contradic- 
tion belong to truth, just as weeds are a negation of 
herbs and still at the same time herbs. 



212 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

In conclusion I call your attention to the eminently 
proletarian character of the science of truth. It gives 
to the working class the logical justification to renounce 
all clerical and mystic control and to look for salvation 
in this same world in which divine truth is living. 



SEVENTH LETTER 



The philologists distinguish carefully between a 
science of language and a science of languages. The 
latter teaches Egyptian, Assyrian, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, 
English, French, etc., while the former treats of the gen- 
eral characteristics common to all languages, of language 
itself. 

Philosophical logic stands in the same relation to 
other sciences. The latter make us acquainted with 
special truths, while logic treats of truth in general. 
Those overintelligent people who claim that truth is 
merely a collective term for many truths do not see the 
woods for trees. Herder, Wilhelm von Humblodt, Max 
Miiller, Steinthal, etc., have many things to say about the 
science of language of which the linguists with many 
languages never dream. 

The science of language, aside from its many ameni- 
ties, is also burdened with a difficult problem which it 
cannot solve without the help of logic. This problem is 
the point of differentiation where babbling and word- 
mongery cease and intelligent speech begins. For hu- 
man speech has a certain meaning, and even the cries 
of the animals are not without sense. The sparrows 
know how to converse together, the rooster calls hh 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 213 

flock together, the dog knows how to announce that a 
stranger enters his master's home. Not alone the jokers, 
but serious thinkers speak of animal language, of a sign 
language, and maintain that speech does not alone con- 
sist of words, but also of inarticulate sounds and gest- 
ures. Poets endow even the storm, the thunder and the 
winds with speech. We wish to clear this confusion and 
ascertain what language is and where it begins. Lan- 
guages, as is well" known, have their beginning at the 
Tower of Babel. But in order to get close to language, 
we must look for a beginning of things either in God or 
in logic. 

You know the old question : Which was first, the egg 
or the hen? But only a frivolous mind overlooks the 
serious side of this question and turns it into a mere 
joke. The question of beginning and end is an emi- 
nently logical one, and an unequivocal and clear answer 
to it would bring light not alone into the science of lan- 
guage, but also into the human brain. 

Let us, therefore, follow up the problem of the "ori- 
gin of language" a little farther. When our forefathers 
dealt with this question, they thought that a God had 
given speech to man or some genius had invented it. 
They thought of a beginning in time. The modern 
thinkers speculate more deeply. They have found out 
that language is not a fixed thing, but fluid, and has 
risen from low beginnings to a great perfection. We can 
no more find its temporal beginning by looking back- 
ward than we can see its end by looking ahead. For this 
reason we no longer look for its temporal, but for its 
ideological beginning. (Steinthal.) We should like to 
have a fixed mark where we might say: Lip to this 
point that which resembles speech is only roaring, ex- 



214 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

clamation, noise, and here is the beginning of the well 
articulated sound which deserves the name of "spoken 
word." 

But there is still another factor which complicates the 
question further. Some say: It is not only the sound, 
the word, which constitutes speech, but the connected 
sentence ; there must be sense and reason mixed with it. 
And this applies to the speaker and to the listener. Lan- 
guage presupposes reason. 

Then, again, intellect is not a fixed thing, but a fluid 
process which develops in, from, and by speech. So it 
appears on one side as if the mind produces language, 
and on the other, as if language produces the mind, the 
reason. Where, then, is the beginning and end, and how 
can we bring order into these relations? 

For us, who are studying the mind, not the lan- 
guage, the conclusion follows that it is not alone the 
word, but also the sound, the tone, the gesture, that all 
things have a meaning and speak a language. We find 
mind wherever we penetrate with our mind. Not alone 
language, but the world is connected with the mind, 
with the thought. But the connection with language 
may well serve as an illustration by which the connection 
of the cosmic mind may be demonstrated and the human 
brain illuminated. 

Language shares the honor with the mind of being 
extolled, even in this sober century, if not to the skies, 
at least far out of the general connection of common 
things. For this reason, we must emphasize in the case 
of language as in that of the mind, that they exist, that 
they are part and parcel of the universal existence. At 
this point I wish to give you a vivid illustration of the 
unity of all being by pointing out that it is indubitably 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 215 

established by the existence of one single name which is 
sufficient to designate All. True, language employs 
many names for this unity of the world, but that is a 
luxury. It is logical and necessary for the intellect to 
have one name for the All, because everything is not only 
infinitely variegated, but also infinitely one, or a unit. 
There are many different waters, but all water partakes 
of the general nature of water. Unless that nature is 
present, there is no water and the name of water does 
not apply. In the same way there are many kinds of oil ; 
olive oil, kerosene oil, castor oil, etc., and each kind has 
its own subdivisions. But everything that has a common 
name is a unit. 

Kindly observe, now, that the names of things form 
just such circles as the water does after being struck by 
a stone. Just as the name water, so the name oil indi- 
cates a ring. Then the name fluid constitutes another 
and wider ring which includes both oil and water. Then 
the name matter draws a still wider circle and includes 
solids as well as fluids, and finally the name being, or 
All, includes mind and matter, all matter and force, in- 
cluding heaven and hell, in one sole ring, in one unit. 

On the basis of this universal unity, from which it 
becomes apparent that high and low, dry and fluid, in 
short the whole universe is made of the same substance, 
any fantastic thinker can prove that human and animal 
language is one, for otherwise one could not refer to 
both of them as language. He may then justly contend 
that speech, producing a sound, is a noise, that speech and 
noise are one. Speech is sound and sound speaks. In 
this way language would have no beginning and no end. 
In the last analysis it would be one with all things, and 
all things would be one with it. In this way the whole 



216 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

universe would become an inexplicable, incomprehensi- 
ble, inexpressible mixture of speech. 

And yet it is an old story that man's insight grows 
the more he magnifies a thing. The more excessively 
we exaggerate a thing, the plainer become its boundaries. 
Language indeed requires one single name for All, but 
it also requires an infinite number of names in order to 
specify the parts of All. Inasmuch as language claims to 
be only a part of existence, this part has to be bounded, 
and you should in this connection remember the un- 
limited freedom of man in drawing such boundaries. 
Words are not merely empty words, but names of cosmic 
parts, of cosmic rings of undulation. Language, or 
rather the mind connected with language, wishes to 
bound the infinite by the help of language. The in- 
stinctive popular use of language does this in a hap- 
hazard way. Conscious science proceeds in an exact 
manner. Just as it has determined on the field of tem- 
perature what should be called hot and what warm, so 
it is at liberty on the field of sounds to determine where 
the name of language begins or ceases. The end of the 
discussion of language is therefore this : That which 
has already been done to horse power has not yet been 
done to the concept of language ; it has been somewhat 
fixed by common usage, but only insufficiently. And so 
the moral of this tale is that the things of this world, 
even mind and language, are connected and interming- 
ling undulations of the same stream, which has neither 
beginning nor end. 

Let me say it once more clearly and without circum- 
locution: The logic which I teach and the thought 
which is its object are parts of the world, of the infinite, 
and every part Being a piece of the infinite is likewise 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 217 

infinite. Every part partakes of the nature of the infi- 
nite. Hence you must not expect that I should exhaust 
my infinite subject. I confine myself to the logical chap- 
ter of "the One and the Many." I simply wish to make 
it plain that without any contradiction the whole multi- 
plicity of existence is of the same nature, and that this 
oneness of nature subdivides into manifold forms. The 
world is interconnected and this interconnection is sub- 
divided into departments. It adds to the general en- 
lightenment of the human brain to recognize this in re- 
gard to language, to mind, to all parts of the universe. 

I repeat, then : One may think logically without hav- 
ing attended any lectures on logic, just as one may raise 
potatoes without a scientific knowledge of agriculture. 
It was possible to invent the thermometer, to clearly dis- 
tinguish between sounds and colors, and a hundred other 
things, without having explained the faculty of discrimi- 
nation. But the most abstract distinctions, such as be- 
ginning and end, word and meaning, body and soul, man 
and animal, matter and force, truth and error, presup- 
pose for their explanation a logical explanation of their 
interconnection with our intellect. 



EIGHTH LETTER 

Dear Eugene: 

Logic is going through the same experience as eco- 
nomics. The economists of the capitalist era talk solely 
of the means and ways by which profit and surplus value 
may be increased They discuss only its relative size, its 
increase or decrease. But the thing itself, its origin and 
descent, is not discussed. It is passed in silence that 



218 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

profit is extracted from labor power by paying less for 
a day's work than is produced by it. The gentlemen talk 
only of the "wealth of nations," but not of their poverty. 
And though this was due to ignorance in the beginning, 
it has later become sheer roguery. 

The formal logicians are as ignorant as they are 
roguish, when they persist in discussing the intellect or 
thought in the traditional manner as if they were iso- 
lated things, while ignoring the necessary connection of 
the object of the logical study with the world of expe- 
riences. This interconnection leads to an explanation of 
truth and error, of sense and nonsense, of god and idols, 
and this is very inopportune for the professors. For 
this reason this unwelcome problem is handed over to 
the mystical departments, to metaphysics and religion, 
so that these venerable pillars of official wisdom may con- 
tinue their services to the ruling classes. 

I have already stated in my letters that the kernel of 
my discussion turns on the distinction between formal 
and what I call proletarian logic. The formal logicians 
treat the intellect as a thing "in itself," while I express 
in many different ways the fact that the intellect does 
not exist by itself, but is interconnected with all things 
and with the universe. 

That intellect has indeed a transcendental leaning, 
which seeks vent by trying to exclude now music, now 
language, now itself, now some other fetich from the 
universal interrelation. But the science of the mind 
teaches that the brain watching its own activity finds 
out that all affirmations and negations, assertions and 
contradictions, belong to the one omnipotent world 
mechanism, which keeps them stored within itself and 
which is actually truth and life. Inasmuch as the human 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 219 

brain is of the same nature as this automatic universal 
being and interconnected with it, logic is at the same time 
religion, metaphysics, and world wisdom.* 

Formal logic teaches that our intellect must keep all 
things apart, but does not teach that it must also connect 
them. This logic is right in one way and yet does not 
arrive at the goal of a clear world philosophy, because it 
permits the transcendental leaning to exaggerate the dif- 
ferences and distinctions. It overlooks the paradoxical 
or dialectical nature of things which are not only sepa- 
rated but also connected. What must be understood is 
that, generally speaking, the classification of the universe 
is only a formality. We are, indeed, justified in distin- 
guishing between above and below, right and left, be- 
ginning and end, gold and sheet metal, good and bad, 
but we must also enlighten ourselves as to how multi- 
plicity can be a unity, the variable constant, and the con- 
stant variable. Formal logic has a wrong name. It is 
not formal, but transcendental. It shares the common 
prejudice that there are absolutely contradictory things 
or irreconcilable opposites, that there are essential dif- 
ferences which have no connection, no bridge between 
them, nothing in common. It teaches that contradictions 
cannot exist, and contradicts itself by clinging to the be- 
lief that there are irreconcilable contradictions. It 
teaches that a thing which contradicts itself is inconceiv- 
able, is not true, and thus reveals that it is not well in- 
formed on the formality of contradictions, on the true 
conciliation of contradictions, and on universal truth. 
Gold is not sheet iron, that is true enough. Whoever 



* Religion denotes here as much as conception of the world and 
explanation of its last questions ; and metaphysics stands here for 
everything conceivable, which meaning embraces more than the 
mere tangible. — Editor. 



220 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

calls gold sheet metal or sheet metal gold, contradicts 
himself. In the actual world both things are separated. 
Yet they are not separated to such extent that gold and 
sheet iron do not partake of the same nature, of the na- 
ture of all metal. Gold and sheet iron are unlike metals, 
but they have the same metallic likeness. That like 
things are different and different things alike, that it is 
everywhere only a question of the degree of difference, 
of formal differences, this is overlooked by "formal" 
logic and by all who seek truth in any logical diagram or 
fetich, instead of in the eternal, omnipresent existence 
of the inseparable universe. 

Our logic deals with truth or with the universe, 
which contains the most sublime gods and the meanest 
deviltry, in other words, which contains everything. In 
the world truth there is contained error^ pretense, lies, 
just as death also lives in it. In other words, error, pre- 
tense, lies, death are only phenomena, formalities, pass- 
ing trifles or things which are nothing compared to the 
one thing, that thing of all things, which is being, truth, 
life. 

The understanding of the one living world truth is so 
greatly aggravated by the so-called contradictions which 
it contains. We find for instance that where one thing 
ends another begins. The end of the one is the begin- 
ning of another. Every beginning is at the same time 
an end. Both are contained in one another, and yet in 
our minds beginning and end are separated. We find 
the beginning and the end everywhere and nowhere. 
Or look into space. You do not see any boundary, and 
yet your vision reaches only a certain distance. Your 
vision is bounded and yet there is no boundary to be 
seen. Or look at life. Death soon arrives, and yet a 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 221 

closer look shows that death is not really death, for "a 
new life arises from the ruins." The world proves to be 
the eternal life which docs not know death. It is a con- 
tradiction to say that death lives, but this contradiction 
can be solved by the understanding that the difference be- 
tween life and death, however great, is still a formal 
one, a difference which like all other differences is re- 
duced to relative insignificance bv the infinite cosmic 
life. 

There exists a widely diffused school, if this term 
may be applied to the unschooled, that preaches pa- 
tience in the matter of the systematization of our 
thoughts or the enlightenment of our intellect, and 
though it no longer hopes for a mysterious revelation, 
yet founds its faith on natural science which has ex- 
plained so many things to us and which is finally sup- 
posed to throw light on the "last questions of all knowl- 
edge." But I can easily convince you that the new coun- 
tries, plants, animals, Esquimaux, that may be discov- 
ered on polar expeditions, or the inventions which Edi- 
son may perhaps make on the field of electricity, or the 
experiences which future astronomers may gather in re- 
gard to suns, moons, and comets, while they may add 
valuable contributions to science and life, will yet do little 
toward a correct general employment of our intellect or 
to a universal enlightenment of the human brain. On 
the other hand, an enlightenment as to the nature and 
meaning of contradictions will spread light to the re- 
motest corners of imagination, into the heavens and 
eternity, into the existence of the whole, the unity and 
difference of all things 

The most drastic, and perhaps the most instructive, 
illustration of the correct meaning of contradictions is 



222 LETTERS ON - LOGIC 

given by the contrast between truth and untruth. These 
two poles are perhaps more widely separated than the 
North Pole and the South Pole, and yet they are as in- 
timately connected as these two. The commonplace logic 
will hardly listen to the demonstration of the unity of 
such apparently wide opposites as truth and untruth. 
Therefore you will pardon me, if I illustrate this exam- 
ple by others, for instance by the contrast between day 
and night. Take it that the day lasts twelve hours and 
the night likewise. Day and night are opposites. Where 
there is day cannot be any night, and yet day and night 
constitute one single day of twenty-four hours, in which 
they both dwell harmoniously. It is the same with truth 
and untruth. The world is the truth, and error, pre- 
tense, and lies are embodied in it, are parts of the actual 
world, just as night is a part of day without confusing 
logic. We may honestly speak of genuine pretense and 
true lies, without any contradiction. Just as unreason 
has still some reason left, so untruth still lives inevitably 
in truth, because the latter is all-embracing, is the uni- 
verse. 

"Contradictions cannot exist." But confused brains 
full of contradictions nevertheless exist. Knives with- 
out handles and blades, two mountains without a valley 
between them, and other nonsense, exist as a phrase. 
There are two kinds of contradictions: Senseless ones 
and very sensible ones. Yea, the whole world* is an in- 
finite and inexhaustible contradiction, which contains in- 
numerable sensible statements and misstatements, 
which never disappear and yet may be solved harmo- 
niously by the help of time and reason. 

From this it follows that the formal criteria of truth 



'When we consider its many parts as such. — Editor. 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 223 

which are on everybody's tongue, such as the identity 
of thought with its object, and the absence of all con- 
tradictions, do not furnish a basis at all for the analysis 
of truth and cannot define it, except in an ignorant and 
roguish way. 

Since the prophet Daniel scattered ashes in the tem- 
ple and unmasked the servants of Baal, other idol wor- 
shippers have continued to stimulate the people to daily 
sacrifices, in order to steal the victuals at night. This 
continual rascality and its repeated exposure has blunted 
the desire of the people to serve truth, so that a great 
many have become frivolous and indifferent. This ras- 
cally logic, not to mention ignorance, encourages the 
frivolous and indifferent in their godless departure from 
truth. In the pulpit and in the garb of science it 
preaches the vanity and inadequacy of research. This 
is preached not as a dogma, but as a logical science, and 
thus the senseless contradiction is committed of trying 
to prove truly by the help of the intellect that the intel- 
lect is too limited to grasp the truth and prove it. 

In its historical course logical research once arrived 
at such a result in good faith. This happened in the fa- 
mous "Critique of Reason" of Immanuel Kant. Our 
shrewd friends of darkness now seek to utilize the fame 
of this work, to which it is entitled on account of its 
great contribution toward the elucidation of cosmic 
truth, for the purpose of preventing on the strength of 
it a progress of enlightenment beyond the standpoint of 
Kant. 

By the way, Kant has demonstrated that the truth in 
general is as much a matter of experience as the brain 
with which we search for it. He has shown beyond a 
doubt that our eyes and ears are inseparably connected 



224 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

with our mind and with the whole cosmic truth. But 
the persistent spirit of transcendentalism, or what is the 
same thing, the traditional belief in the transcendental 
spirit, has led him to grant a mysterious existence along- 
side of or above the human mind, alongside of or above 
the cosmic truth, to an incomprehensible monster spirit 
and to a fantastical hyper-truth. 

The Kantian critique of reason did not understand 
the universality of truth. It still affirmed the existence 
of two worlds and two truths without any unity. And as 
it is the curse of the evil deed to generate more evil, it 
produced two intellects. (1) The poor little subservient 
intellect of man, and (2) the enormous and abnormal 
intellect of the Lord, who is supposed to understand the 
incomprehensible and to untie the most senseless contra- 
dictions like so many knots. 

The truth which is the universe, the cosmic or uni- 
versal truth, will reveal to you the absurdity of abnormal 
humility which is contained in the dualistic doctrine of 
the two minds. Of course, the philosopher Kant had a 
greater intellect than Peter Simple. But nevertheless all 
intellects partake of the nature of the general intellect, 
and no intellect can step above or below this general na- 
ture without losing sense or reason. One cannot speak 
of another, higher, faculty of thought than that acquired 
by man through experience without dropping from logic 
to absurdity. No doubt the animal world possesses 
something similar to intellect. No doubt, also, the ani- 
mal mind may be separated from the human mind by 
some special name, for instance "instinct." No doubt, 
furthermore, our reason is strengthened by culture from 
generation to generation. But that anywhere and at any 
time there should come into existence a faculty of 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 225 

thought which would stand outside of the cosmic inter- 
connection, that is an absurd conception and a sense- 
less thing. Just as necessarily as all water has one and 
the same nature, that of being wet, just so necessarily 
every intelligence and every thought partakes of the gen- 
eral nature of thought and must logically be a part, a 
particular part, of the one universal and empirical world. 



NINTH LETTER 



Repetition, my dear Eugene, is the mother of all 
study. 

Logic aims to teach you the proper use of the intellect, 
not only in this or that branch of study, but in the gen- 
eral branch of truth. Its result is the following precept: 
In all things always remember the universal interrela- 
tion. 

In order to illustrate this statement a little, let me 
point out that in the period of scholasticism thinking 
was practiced without any interconnection with the rest 
of the world, merely by brown study. The present age 
of natural sciences then cultivated a better method. But 
the method of the natural sciences has not succeeded so 
far in being applied to the field of law, morals, politics, 
psychology, and philosophy, because the logical under- 
standing of the total interrelation of the indivisible world 
truth was lacking, because the concept of truth was en- 
veloped in darkness, and because the privileged classes 
have a great interest in maintaining darkness. 

For this reason, the true method of reasoning still re- 
quires many explanations. The socialist, for instance, is 



226 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

charged with inciting the people, with promising more 
than he can keep and with sowing strife in the hearts 
of men. Those who make this charge in the common- 
place sense, tear two things, viz., peace and strife, out 
of their due connection. As a matter of fact, peace and 
strife must always dwell together. A nation whose peace 
were not intermingled with a certain strife, would be a 
nation of sluggards. Thanks to the strife in their breasts, 
the nations are progressive and stirring. Motion is .the es- 
sence of the world, and national motion is inconceivable 
without the striving of men. For the sake of develop- 
ment and culture, nations must always demand more 
than they can immediately attain. On the other hand, 
striving of this sort is not sufficient. One must not de- 
mand more than one can obtain, nor promise more than 
one can give. For this reason the logical socialist must 
know that even in the future society the trees will not 
grow into the clouds, and that the peace for which we 
hope and strive will always be mixed with strife. The 
music of the future, although more harmonious than 
the music of the present, will nevertheless be eternally 
marred by disharmony. There is nothing perfect in the 
world, because only the whole universe is perfect, be- 
cause the universe alone is perfectness itself. 

Eternal peace, as the warriors may justly claim, is an 
illusion, so long as we think of peace in a transcendental 
way and as being separated from strife. But the sons 
of the war god who would like to continue the thunder 
of cannons and the rattle of sabers eternally, are no less 
the victims of illusion, if not something worse. Eternal 
is only war in peace and peace in war, although that 
may seem senseless to the logicians of the old school. 
Thus even the inevitable war will become more peaceful 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 227 

and humane in the course of time. The barbarian form 
of war, of which the Prussians are masters, is not des- 
tined to last forever, unless we speak of the illogical 
eternity of the preacher which opens its doors by leaving 
the temporal world. In defending the social war, 1 wish 
to have it understood that neither the conceptions nor 
the things called war and peace are separated by a Chi- 
nese wall. 

Everything is interconnected and interdependent. It 
is true that strife and animosities may be exaggerated, 
and so may peace. But whatever blame attaches to this, 
refers only to the exaggeration. It is not the animosity, 
but the excessive animosity which deserves censure. By 
recognizing the logical interconnection between peace 
and strife, the dispute of the parties is rendered saner. 
There is then no longer a question of a yawning chasm 
between satisfaction and dissatisfaction, but of something 
about which an agreement is possible, viz., how much 
there is of either. 

As peace and war in the human breast, so all variety 
intermingles in the cosmic unit. In the novel "Homo 
Sum," by Ebers, the monk Paulus, who tasted the de- 
lights of the preliminary celestial ecstacy when castigat- 
ing his body, says : "I truly believe that it is just as 
difficult on this globe to find pain without joy as joy 
without pain.'' And Till Eulenspiegel, that type of a 
practical joker, showed an understanding of dialectics 
when he lightened the difficulty of ascending a moun- 
tain by the reflection that the descent on the other side 
would be so much easier. Logic is no more senseless in 
teaching that all things, even the most opposite, are of 
the same substance than it is in showing that night be- 
longs to day and weeds to herbs. 



228 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

In order that these petty illustrations may not con- 
fuse your mind, it should be remembered that the essen- 
tial point is the elucidation of the great contradiction be- 
tween mind and matter, between thinking and being, 
which includes all petty contradictions. 

In order to think in accordance with logical consist- 
ency, you must not regard a thing as something inde- 
pendent, but consider everything as fluid particles of 
the same substance, which is the thing of all things, the 
world, the truth, and life. 

Our logic is therefore the science of truth. This 
truth is neither above nor below, neither in Jerusalem nor 
in Jericho, neither in the spirit nor in the flesh, but 
everywhere. 

Our logic is the science of understanding. It teaches 
that you must not search for understanding by cudgeling 
your brain, but only in connection with experience, with 
the interrelation of things. 

Since man in his experience also meets errors, science 
was dominated for centuries by the question whether 
truth and experience are not two different things, wheth- 
er all our experience is only an illusion of our senses. 
Cartesius replied to this: "No; the belief in a perfect, 
true being cannot admit of such a delusion." By sub- 
stituting the concept of truth for the concept of God, we 
are certain that the world of experience is not a ghost, 
but the most actual reality. 

Although the great Kant called the cosmic truth a 
phenomenon, because he could not divest his mind of 
transcendental faith, of the faith in a transcendental 
truth, still we know today that all distinctions which are 
ever made constitute -but a nibbling at the universal unit. 
As necessarily as all variety in baking produces bakery 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 229 

wares, just as necessarily heaven and earth, and every- 
thing connected with them, are parts of the indivisible 
truth which is also called nature, cosmos, universe, God, 
and experience. Language gives to its darling truth 
many different pet names, just as a happy mother calls 
her heart's treasure by a thousand endearing terms. 

Feuerbach reasons in this fashion: "If God is not 
a personal being different from nature and man, then he 
is an entirely superfluous being. . . . The use of the 
word God which is always combined with the conception 
of a separate being, is a disturbing and confusing abuse. 
Why do you want to be a theist, if you are a naturalist, 
or a naturalist if you are a theist? Away with this con- 
tradiction! Where God is confounded with nature, or 
nature with God, there is neither God nor nature, but a 
mystical amphibious hermaphrodite." 

Feuerbach is right. The name of God is much 
abused. But truth is also blasphemed by negation and 
frivolousness. The sober understanding that God, truth, 
nature, are various names for the same thing permits us 
to play with them without despairing of the matter. In- 
deed, this play of words serves to make the subject 
clear. 

But logic demands that we recognize truth as the ab- 
solute, as the power, the force, and the glory, which com- 
prises all logical and illogical distinctions, together with 
the things to be distinguished, even the faculty of distin- 
guishing itself. 

Such an understanding of the absolute, such world 
wisdom, will not make you conceited, because it makes 
you conscious of the fact that your understanding has 
grasped celestial truth which at the same time is ter- 
restrial, only in a very general way. You possess noth- 



230 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

ing but a definition of truth. And without denying that 
definitions are valuable and instructive, I, at the same 
time, point out that you know very little about astrono- 
my when you know that it is the science of the stars. 
No matter, therefore, how clearly I may have defined 
truth, we require for its complete understanding all the 
details of science., and that is too much for me, for you, 
and for any individual human being. 

Just as our vision never exhausts the visible, because 
the eye sees an object but does not fully penetrate it, just 
so can the intellect never fully understand and fathom 
the absolute all, the truth, or God. But we can under- 
stand and fathom individual truths, parts of the uni- 
versal truth. What understanding grasps is' not the 
truth itself, but yet it is true understanding. 



TENTH LETTER 

Dear Eugene : 

My previous lectures instructed you as to the very 
trivial fact that the thought is a part of the world. In 
proceeding from the part to the whole, I passed logically 
from the mouth of the river to its source. The universe 
is the maternal womb of the intellect as of all things. 

It occurs to me that you or some teacher of logic 
might accuse my letters of lack of logic. It may seem 
that these lectures fail to present the subject matter in 
a strictly systematized form. You will, please, excuse 
this in part with the fact that they appear in the form 
of letters. This form demands that the contents should 
be logically arranged and rounded off in each letter It 
should furthermore serve as an excuse for any defect, 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 231 

that my subject is not a finished one, not perfectly elab- 
orated by others before me. I am here not merely a 
lecturer, but also an explorer on a field which, though 
much investigated, yet is still rather obscure. 

The conclusion of my last letter explained that the 
use of the term God for the universe has much to rec- 
ommend it and much to disqualify it. But it is easily 
apparent that the universe with its absolute qualities is 
closely related to that infinite being of whom Jakob 
Bohme, the philosophical shoemaker, said : "He is 
neither the light nor the darkness, neither love nor an- 
ger, but the eternal One. . . Hence all forces are 
merely one sole force." 

That nothing exists outside of the universe, that 
everything is contained in the All, that the All, with all 
real and imagined beings, is everything, that it is neither 
sweet nor sour, neither great nor small, but just every- 
thing and all, this statement is as obvious as the often 
and long repeated statement of identity : A equals A. 

The All is omnipotent, omnipresent, all-wise. This 
last term might be questioned, since the universe is not 
a dummy with a monster head and giant brain. For this 
very reason it was considered inappropriate to apply 
the name of God to the universe;, because that creates 
the impression of a personal being. The All thinks only 
by means of human brains, and for this reason omnis- 
cience cannot be anything but common human knowl- 
edge. Of course, you, I, and every other man, are very 
limited in our knowledge. But still we may indulge in 
the hope that the things which we do not know are 
known by other men or will be discovered by future 
generations, so that the collective human mind will know 
everything that is knowable. We cannot see everything 



232 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

that is visible ; there are animals that can see even better 
than we can. But since even the most intelligent animal 
is supposed to lack the highest degree of intelligence, 
reason and science, there is no one who knows anything 
except the human race. Mankind is omniscient. But 
since all our science is derived only from the world, 
mankind is only the formal bearer of intelligence, and it 
belongs to the fountain of all things, to eternal nature. 
Our wisdom is the wisdom of nature, is world wisdom. 
Although there may be inhabitants of the moon and of 
other stars who may know things which are unknown 
to us, still that is in the first place a mere speculation of 
little value, and in the second place universal omnis- 
cience or the omniscient universe would not in the least 
be affected thereby. It is a reasonable use of the lan- 
guage to regard human wisdom as the only and om- 
niscient wisdom, just as all natural and wet water is 
called water without any further modification. I be- 
lieve in the statement of Protagoras : "Man is the meas- 
ure of all things." Whoever uses a different measure, 
uses a superhuman, transcendental measure.* 

Hence, when I call the cosmic essence of all exist- 
ence omnipotent, you will not think of a senseless magic 
power which forges knives without handles and blades, 
nor will you read any transcendental meaning into my 
use of the term omniscience. 

Omniscience belongs obviously under the head of 
logic, because the organ of science and wisdom is the ob- 
ject of the study of logic. And it must now be stated that 
the human mind does not only exceed the animal mind 
by far, but is also the non plus ultra of all minds. But 
it must be retained that this mind can only be whatever 



♦Please note the additional explanation on page 77. — Editob. 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 233 

it is in connection with the divine universe which I may 
also be permitted to call wordly deity. This name is 
fitting because it is a means of understanding that in 
the first place no monster mind rules the world, and in 
the second place the natural universe is not a mere sum 
of all things, but truth and life. 

Of course, the identification of the universe with the 
religious God is only a comparison, and comparisons are 
lame. Still we may compare the sun with an eternal 
lamp or the moon with a candle, or the German prime 
minister with a butler. 

Logic shall teach you that everything which may be 
distinguished by the faculty of understanding is of the 
same kind, everything is of common clay, but the whole 
is sublimely elevated above all that is commonplace. 
Mere frivolous atheism, as created by the free-thinkers, 
is not sufficient. A bare denial of God always creates 
some other idol worship. The positive understanding 
of the divine world truth is an indispensable requirement 
for the radical extermination of all idol worship. 

Logic must begin with the sublime, infinite, absolute. 
All logical, consistent or interconnected thinking must 
take its departure from it. The so-called scientific re- 
search after temporal causes, after the egg from which 
the chicken was hatched, after the hen from which the 
egg came, after the kindred organisms which developed 
the hen by natural selection and adaption according to 
Darwin, this is a very valuable research without which 
we can never understand the world process. But never- 
theless, such research must not satisfy the thinking man. 
Logic demands from everybody that he or she should 
search for the highest, for the cause of all causes. Who- 
ever feels the desire to bring logical order into his con- 



234 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

sciousness, must know that the finite and infinite, the 
relative and the absolute, the special truths and the one 
general truth, are contained in one another. 

Logical thought as demanded by science means noth- 
ing but to be aware of the final cause, the absolute foun- 
dation of all thought. This foundation is the universe, 
an attribute of which is the external and internal human 
head. The thousand year old dispute between the mate- 
rialists and the idealists turns on the question whether 
the spirit is material or the world spiritual. Our an- 
swer is plain and clear: They both belong together, 
they together make up the one thing, the thing of all 
things. Mind and matter are two attributes of the same 
substance. They may be compared the same as fish and 
flesh, the former being called very appropriately by some 
African tribes "water flesh." In this way, matter and 
mind are two kinds of meat of a different and yet of the 
same nature. 

I remember reading in a satirical paper the ques- 
tion : "What is a gentleman? Answer: A gentleman 
is a loafer with money, and a loafer is a gentleman 
without money." Just as these two types of men are es- 
sentially alike and differ only in the small matter of 
money, so you should remember that there are no es- 
sential differences, that all differences are merely mat- 
ters of attributes and qualities of the same absolute 
world substance. To distinguish correctly and logically, 
that is the point which logic is aiming to teach us. To 
make distinctions is the function which is also called 
perceiving, knowing, understanding, comprehending. 
When you consider that this function is innate in man, 
and that man together with his faculty of understanding 
is innate in nature, then you recognize all distinctions 



LETTERS ON LOGIC #35 

and the distinguished objects as attributes of the undis- 
tinguished One, of the absolute, compared to which all 
things are only relative things, in other words, attrib- 
utes. 

I am endeavoring to make clear to you that logical 
thinking requires the awakening of the consciousness of 
the one supreme general nature. And you must not 
think of this sum of all existence in the stupid way in 
which people used to think of the animal kingdom be- 
fore Darwin, but regard the world as a living organic 
unit, from which the faculty of understanding has blos- 
somed the same as all other things. In the logic of the 
narrow-minded, all animal species are widely separated, 
without any living interconnection, while Darwin has 
demonstrated the uniform process, the intermingling life 
in multiform creation. The illustration of this famous 
zoologist of the transition from one species to another 
may serve as an example of the logical transitions in the 
world process, in which all differences are but undula- 
tions. All our classifications must always remember the 
undivided basis on which they are resting. 

We have shown that the intellect divides the univer- 
sal nature, classifies and analyzes it, and we have learned 
of the universal nature that it not only furnishes to the 
intellect the material for its work, but also that the world 
comprises within its general process the intellectual pro- 
cess, that the intellectual movement is a specialization of 
the natural movement. 

The world is not only the object, but also the subject 
of understanding, it understands, it dissects its own mul- 
tiplicity by means of the human intellect. Our wisdom is 
world wisdom in a two-fold sense : The world is that 
which is being understood, classified, analyzed, and at the 



236 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

same time it is that which, by the help of our intellect, 
practices understanding, classification, etc. When I call 
the human mind the cosmic mind, the mind of the su- 
preme being, I wish to have it understood that there is 
nothing mysterious about this, that I merely intend to 
show that thought or intelligence can only operate in the 
universal cosmic interconnection, that it is not an abnor- 
mal and transcendental thing, but a thing like all other 
things. 

You must not conceive of the spirit as the producer 
of truth, as a little god, but only as a means. The true 
god, the divine truth, has our intellect for an attribute. 
The latter does not produce truth, but only the under- 
standing of truth. It produces only pictures of truth 
which are all more or less perfect. Of course, it is not 
at all immaterial whether we produce a more or less 
faithful, a true or a false picture of truth, but still this 
is, at present and for us here, a secondary matter. The 
main thing is to know that truth, or nature, is far above 
all pictures, and still consists of parts, of forms, which 
together constitute the whole. 



ELEVENTH LETTER 

Dear Eugene : 

Johannes Scherr relates in the "Gartenlaube," a 
German family paper, in an article entitled "Mahomet 
and His Work," that insane doctrinarians are searching 
for people without religion. This has not succeeded, 
it is said, although the spark of religious feeling is 
glowing very dimly in peoples that are close to the ani- 
mal. But nevertheless, he continues, the expressions of 
religious feeling mark the boundary line where the 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 237 

beast ceases and man begins. For just as in the higher 
stages of civilization religion means the consciousness 
of the finite of being one with the infinite, so in the 
lower stages of civilization the indefinite impulse is 
felt by man to connect his special nature with the 
universal nature and bring them into harmony. This 
is idealism, the idealistic need. It is obvious that, and 
why, the people have always and everywhere sought 
and found satisfaction for their idealistic longings in 
religion. But, adds the shrewd observer, I must re- 
mark that I do not refer to the shifting population 
when I say "people," for sad to relate, that population 
is torn away from all connection with natural con- 
ditions. I refer to the "settled, the permanent, the 
true people." 

This quotation shows that a champion of the "true 
people" is in conflict with true logic. In dividing a 
population into shifting and settled people, one should 
retain as a basis the logical consciousness that all 
classes of people are embraced by one class; further- 
more, that human, monkey, ant, and other nations are 
parts of the one and the same nation ; until finally man 
and animal, real and imaginary, with all religious and 
godless things, are ultimately fused in the world unit 
and can never be "torn away from all connection with 
natural conditions." 

All distinctions must logically be based on the con- 
sciousness of the absolute and universal unity, of the 
interconnection of all things. For this reason some 
pious people, with their God in whom everything is 
living and has its being, have more logic than some 
freethinkers of the class of Johannes Scherr who have 
no coherence in their method of thought. The faith- 



238 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

fnl think more logically than the narrowly skeptical, 
for they begin and end with God. But still they can- 
not think quite logically, because they cannot estab- 
lish any logical connection between their eternally 
perfect Lord and evil, the devil, disease, misery, sin, in 
short all the sufferings and vanities here below. 

The unit of nature, the infinite, is the quintessence 
of logic. Neither natural science in the narrow sense 
of the word, nor metaphysics, nor formal logic, can 
give any clue as to the nature of this thing of things. 
This can be done only by a science of understanding 
which recognizes matter and mind and all opposites 
and contradictions as formalities of the universe. How 
can a man who is out of touch with the mass of the 
shifting population feel that he is one with the uni- 
verse? Whoever regards any special class as the true 
people, has no understanding either of the common 
people or of the absolute universe. 

Proletarian logic teaches not only the equality of all 
human beings, but universal equality. And mark well, 
this universal equality does not conflict with variety 
any more than a variety of pots and jugs conflicts with 
the unity of vessels, or the manifold forms of bretzels 
and rolls with the unity of bakery ware. 

The enemies of democratic development, in at- 
tacking the idea of freedom and equality, point to the 
manifoldness of nature, the individual differences of 
men, the distinctions between weak and strong, wise 
and fools, men and women, and consider it tyranny to 
attempt to equalize that which nature has made dif- 
ferent. They cannot understand that like things may 
be different and different things alike. They are 
blinded by their class logic which sees only the differ- 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 239 

ences, but not the unity, not the transfusion of all 
classes. 

Class logic teaches that contradictory things can- 
not exist. According to it, a thing cannot be genuine 
and false at the same time. This class logic has a nar- 
row conception of existence. It has only observed 
that there are many different things in nature, but has 
overlooked the fact that all these things have also a 
general nature. We, on the other hand, recognize that 
every thing, every person, is a part of the infinite world 
and partakes of its general nature, is eternal and per- 
ishable, true and untrue, great and small, one sided and 
manyfold, in short contradictory. 

Before and after Socrates, philosophy and religion 
have searched for the genuine, right, good, true, and 
beautiful, but have reached no harmonious results. 
But it cannot be denied that in the course of the cen- 
turies the problem has become clearer and clearer. 
The great names of Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato, Aris- 
totle, Bacon, Cartesius, Spinoza, Leibniz, Kant, Hegel, 
are milestones on the highway of this progress. The 
evolution is apparent, but the interrelation between the 
intellectual and physical, and especially between intellec- 
tual and economic evolution, is much ignored. The bridge 
between mind and body was not found, and philosophical 
evolution has been regarded up to our day as a purely 
mental process accomplished by one or two dozen of 
famous brains. I wish to point out to you now, that 
proletarian logic is the continuation of the preceding 
research after the genuine, true, good, and beautiful. 
It teaches how to conceive of these ideals logically, 
and it has not so much proceeded from any one 



240 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

talented brain, but is rather the product of the entire 
cosmic process. 

Philosophical brains have developed the science of 
logical thought only to the extent that the material de- 
velopment of the world has stimulated them to do so. 
You must regard the human brains only as secondary 
levers of the universal lever which is not only genuine, 
true, good, and beautiful, but truth, goodness, and 
beauty itself, or the world and the absolute. 

The understanding of the absolute which is called 
"good Lord," and then again "the bad world," in other 
words the selfsufficient cosmos, is very inconvenient 
to the wisdom of the professors, and they are attempt- 
ing to assign it to a special study which they call 
"metaphysics." This division of labor is not intro- 
duced for the purpose of making research more pro- 
ductive, but of surrounding this study by mysterious 
darkness. The professors who lecture to the young 
people on formal logic set aside the ancient research 
after the true, the good, the beautiful, and try to place 
these ideals outside of the light of science in order to 
be able to preserve them unchanged in the tabernacle 
of faith. 

This charge may seem unjust, because the learned 
gentlemen reserved a corner for the true, the good, and 
the beautiful in their metaphysical department. But 
there is something peculiar about this. The great 
Kant has asked the plain question : "Is metaphysics 
practicable as a science?" Answer: No! The trans- 
cendental truth, etc., sought by metaphysics, and 
named God, freedom, immortality in Christian lan- 
guage, cannot be found by any reason. But being a 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 241 

child of his time, the great philosopher makes a small 
concession to the transcendental. 

He teaches : Although transcendental truth can- 
not be located scientifically, still the religious faith 
in its existence is wholesome. We, in our time, think 
more soberly about this theory of salvation and accept 
the elimination of all transcendentalism from science. 
While the spokesmen of the "true people" would like 
to hide their exalted truth, freedom, and immortality 
behind the curtains of temples, we throw the full day- 
light of logic on the absolute truth, goodness, and 
beauty of the material world. 

Logic as the science of correct thought cannot be 
restricted to any one object, it cannot exclude any ob- 
ject, whether terrestrial or heavenly, from its sphere. 
The great lights of present day learning do not wish to 
subordinate the intellect as the object of the logical 
department, and absolute truth as the object of the meta- 
physical department, to one another, but to co-ordinate 
them side by side. 

But two co-ordinated things which are not subor- 
dinated to a third higher thing lack logic, and the brain 
which is satisfied by such a condition suffers from dis- 
order. Logical truth must inevitably be a part of ab- 
solute truth, and it is our duty to remove absolute truth 
from the field of metaphysics, of transcendentalism, and 
to transfer it to the sober world which forms an insepar- 
able unit with the human mind. 

So much for the proletarian duty to continue the 
research after the true, the good, and the beautiful 
which was the object of the philosophers before and 
after Socrates. But remember that I am referring only 
to the truly good, beautiful, etc., which is contained in 



24-2 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

the universal truth of all true specifications. The ques- 
tion of the ethically good, the esthetically beautiful 
and the absolutely perfect is as necessarily contained 
in the question of the universal truth as red, blue, and 
green in the rainbow, of course only in an abstract 
sense. 

Our logic which has for its object the truth of the 
universe, is the science of the understanding of the uni- 
verse, a science of universal understanding or concep- 
tion of the world. It teaches that the interrelation of 
all things is truth and life, is the genuine, right, good, 
and beautiful. All the sublime moving the heart of 
man, all the sweet stirring his breast, is the universal 
nature or the universe. But the vexing question still 
remains : What about the negative, the ugly, the evil, 
what about error, pretense, standstill, disease, death, 
and the devil? 

True, the world is vain, evil, ugly. But these are 
merely accidental phenomena, only forms and appen- 
dages of the world. Its eternity, truth, goodness, 
beauty, is substantial, existing, positive. Its negative 
is like the darkness which serves to make the light 
more brilliant, so that it may overcome the dark and 
shine so much more brightly. 

The spokesmen of the ruling classes. are not open 
for such a sublime optimism, because they have the 
pessimistic duty of perpetuating misery and servitude. 



TWELFTH LETTER 

Logic, the science of correct thought, demands in 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 243 

the first place true, or in other words, reasonable 
thought. Logic deals with reason and truth. 

These two things have been endowed with a mys- 
terious nature, while they obviously belong to the 
entire universe and its tangible nature. Reason and 
truth are not separated from the other things, are not 
things in themselves. There is no such thing. Philoso- 
phers who have looked for them in the depths of the 
human brain with their hands over their, eyes and en- 
gaged in brown study, were on the wrong road. Pro- 
letarian logic differs from conventional logic in that 
it does not look for reason and truth behind the cur- 
tains of temples, nor in the brains of the learned, but 
it discovers them in the actual interconnection of all 
things and processes of nature. 

Preachers, professors, judges, and politicians are 
the leaders of "the wise men of Gotham," and since we 
have all passed our youth among them, we find it difficult 
to get rid of their confused logic. 

We owe much of our better insight to the famous 
philosophers. These men had many an eccentric no- 
tion, but on the whole they were reasonable fellows 
who followed the doctrine of the unreliability of the 
senses and the faith in the hidden truth and reason 
more in a theoretical than in a practical way. In prac- 
tice they operated with open eyes and ears. Thus 
correct logic, although confused by queer notions, has 
been handed down to us from generation to generation. 
Preachers, professors, judges, and politicians cling to 
the confused notions, while we take the liberty to dis- 
card them. 

Now we recognize not only that reason and truth 
are connected with the world, but also that the uni- 



244 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

verse is the supreme reason and truth, is that being 
which religion and philosophy have long been looking 
for, the most perfect being, which Plato called the true, 
good and beautiful, Kant God, freedom, and immor- 
tality, and Hegel the absolute. 

If he is an atheist who denies that perfection can 
be found in any individual, then I am an atheist. And 
if he is a believer in God who has the faith in the "most 
perfect being" with which not alone the theologists, 
but also Cartesius and Spinoza have occupied them- 
selves so much, then I am one of the true children of 
God. 

The abuse of sublime feelings and exalted ideas has 
filled many hearts with disgust, so that they care no 
longer for any unctuous sermons. The mere flavor 
of religion is odious to them. Nevertheless I assure 
you that we shall never get rid of idol worship, unless 
we understand the supreme being, reason or truth, 
in its true nature. 

"Understand" is a mysterious word. To bring light 
into the mystery of understanding by a clear theory 
of understanding, is an integral part of the science of 
thought, of logic. 

Permit me to compare the faculty of understanding 
with a photographic apparatus, by the help of which 
you strive to obtain a picture of the cosmic truth. Then 
you will see at a glance that in this way we can ob- 
tain but a dim picture of the whole. The object ap- 
pears boundless, too infinitely great and sublime to 
permit of copying. And yet we can approach it. Al- 
though we cannot get a true picture of universal 
truth, yet we can obtain clear pictures of individual 
truths, in other words, we can picture the infinite in its 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 245 

parts. By the help of your intellect, you can grasp the 
infinite by means of limitation. 

Absolute truth appears to us in relative phenomena. 
The perfect being is composed of imperfect parts. A 
"wise man of Gotham" may regard this as a senseless 
contradiction. But we can separate the arms, legs, 
head, and trunk from one another, and so separated 
they will be mere parts of a corpse, while connected 
they certainly possess the chance of vitality. Life is 
composed of the dead, the most perfect being is com- 
posed of imperfect parts. In the universal truth every- 
thing is contained. It is the perfect being, it includes 
the whole existence, even the imperfect. The false, 
the ugly, the evil, the nasty are involved in the true, 
the good, the beautiful. The universal existence is the 
absolute truth, the whole is composed of relativities, 
of parts, of phenomena. Our understanding, our in- 
strument of thought, is likewise an imperfect part of 
the perfect being. Our intellect produces only a dim, 
imperfect picture of the absolute, but it reproduces true 
pictures of its parts, although pictures only. 

There are good and bad, adequate and inadequate, 
true and false thoughts and understanding. But there 
are no absolutely true thoughts. All our conceptions 
and ideas are imperfect pictures of the most perfect 
being which is inexhaustible in great things as in small 
things, as a whole and in parts. Every part of nature 
is a natural part of the infinite. 

I repeat: All parts or things of this world have, 
apart from their imperfect nature as parts, also the 
world nature of the absolute being. They are imperfect 
perfections. Our intellect is no exception. The human 
mind is the only mind having the name of reason, and is 



246 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

the most perfect reason which can possibly exist. In 
the same way, the water of this earth is the non plus 
ultra of all water. The belief in another and different 
mind, in a monster mind, belongs to the same trans- 
cendental category as the belief in a celestial river 
without the nature of water flowing around the castle 
of Zion. Even the most perfect mind is nothing else, 
and cannot be anything else, but an imperfect part of 
the absolute world being. 

The first thing a student of correct thought has to 
learn is to distinguish true thought from false thought, 
and for this purpose he must know above all that dis- 
tinction must not be exaggerated. All differences can 
only be relative. The bad and the good pictures be- 
long to the same family, and all families finally belong 
to the absolute, are individuals of the universe. 

For the purpose of distinguishing true thoughts 
from false, it should be remembered that the true 
thought is only a part of the truth, a part which does 
not exaggerate its own importance, but subordinates 
itself to the absolute. , 

The following illustration may explain this. Al- 
though astronomy teaches that the earth revolves 
daily around its axis and that the sun is standing still, 
it nevertheless knows that the fixed state of the sun is 
only a relative truth, so that from a higher point of 
view both the earth and the sun are revolving. The 
consciousness of its relative truth alone makes the 
statement of the sun's standstill true. Again, when the 
farmer sees that the earth is fixed and that the sun is 
moving every day from East to West, he is mistaken 
only so far as he regards his standpoint as the whole 
truth, his farmers' knowledge for absolute knowl- 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 247 

edge. The knowledge of the absolute alone en- 
ables you to distinguish correctly between truth and 
error. Whoever sees the sun turning around the earth 
with the consciousness that this revolution is but a 
partial truth is not in error, but sees truly. The knowl- 
edge of the absolute truth clears up error and instructs 
us as to the method of correct thought. This thought 
makes us apt, humble, and tolerant in judging. 

The "wisest of men" was very proud of his modesty 
in knowing that he knew nothing. His example may 
well be recommended to-day. Although we have 
learned a great deal, we know very little compared 
to the inexhaustible fountain of all wisdom, good 
mother nature. We learn every day, but we never 
learn all there is to learn. What was to the credit of 
Socrates, was his firm faith in the truth, his conviction 
of its existence, and his faith in the mission of the hu- 
man intellect to search for truth. 

On the contrary, the sophists confused and dis- 
puted everything. They frivolously flouted all truth 
and research. This same frivolousness now relies 
upon Kant who, misled by the prejudice of his time, 
removed truth to a transcendental world and therefore 
deprecatingly called our actual world the "world of phe- 
nomena." In distinction from him, our logic teaches that 
the phenomena of this world without exception are parts 
of the one truth, and that the true art of understanding 
consists in studying the parts. 

The doctrine of the sophists to the effect that every- 
thing may be denied and disputed has a certain simi- 
larity with ours in that we declare that the universe is 
the truth and all parts of it true parts, that smoke and 
fog, reason and imagination, dreams and realities, sub- 



248 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

ject and object, are true parts of the world. They are 
not the whole truth, but still true. For this reason 
it is well to call your attention to the difference be- 
tween the sophistical and the logical method of 
thought. The contemporaries of Socrates are still alive 
to-day. They are teaching in the name of God and be- 
lieve in nothing, while to us truth, every day naked 
and sober truth, is sacred. 



THIRTEENTH LETTER 



In his "Three Books On The Soul," Aristotle dis- 
cussed at length the question whether the human soul 
has five senses or one. The commentator, J. H. von 
Kirchmann, the publisher of the "Philosophical Li- 
brary," remarks in his footnote 172 that man has six 
senses. He divides feeling into pure and active feeling. 
According to this, the phrase of the five senses belongs 
to the old iron the same as that of the four elements. 
Now neither you, nor I, nor any reader should worry 
about the question whether all sensation may be sum- 
med up in the one sense of feeling, whether there are 
five senses according to Aristotle, or six according to 
Kirchmann, or whether there is even a seventh sense 
for the transcendental, the organ of which, as some 
optimists hope, will gradually be developed with the 
growing perfection of man. We are concerned in this 
matter only so far as it is connected with the cardinal 
question, whether the world is only one thing or a mere 
collection of an infinite number of disconnected things; 
whether the so-called things are independent subjects 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 249 

and objects, or whether they are only predicates of the 
one world subject. 

Looking through the window I see the river, the 
street, the bridge, houses, and trees. Everything is 
a thing in itself and yet is connected inseparably with 
all others. The qualities of the world are regarded 
by the intellect as subjects ; but the intelligent subject 
should also know that its actions, its distinguishing 
and understanding, are formalities, a formal dismem- 
berment of the absolute, which in spite of all division 
always remains the undivided whole. 

In order to master this method of thought, you 
must understand above all that the things are only so- 
called things, but are in reality qualities of the uni- 
verse, in other words, relative things or predicates of 
the absolute. You will then understand, that our 
thought has a right to make one thing as well as six 
of a chair, its back, its seat, and its four legs. You will 
recognize that the five senses of Aristotle are not an 
eternal truth, but a classification, which is eternally 
variable. Distinguishing means classifying. 

I know very well that I am making a bold state- 
ment here, and that it is not easy to justify it. For 
this reason you must not expect that I can make my 
meaning clear in a few sentences. It is not only the 
general prejudice which prevents this by making a 
most mysterious and miraculous thing of the intel- 
lectual function, but also the fact that this thing is 
still very obscure, although it has become clearer and 
clearer in the course of time. 

The freethinking pastor Hironymi writes on this 
point: "The most prominent naturalists of the present, 
such as Dubois-Reymond, who are at the same time 



250 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

thinkers, admit that they do not know what feeling, 
life, consciousness, are, and how they arise. And this 
ignorance is far more valuable for truth and religion 
than the alleged knowledge. Let us, therefore, continue 
in the devotion with which we have hitherto admired 
the universe without understanding it. The higher 
existence, the consciousness, has not been explained, 
it has remained a miracle, the only lasting, absolute, 
miracle/' 

Thus speaks the preacher who is a know-nothing 
by nature and makes a business of admiring and won- 
dering, while we are interested in understanding and 
knowing. We wish to fathom the mystery, and hence 
I may write still more letters on logic and you may 
study some more. 

I shall try to demonstrate by a trivial example, how 
it is that understanding or distinguishing is based on 
classification. 

Take it that you awake at early dawn and notice in 
a corner of your bed room something uncouth and 
moving which you cannot clearly distinguish. To 
know that a phenomenon appears is not enough be- 
cause the term phenomenon applies to everything, 
natural and unnatural things, good and evil spirits. 
Even if you are sufficiently enlightened to know that 
the thing in question must be something natural, still 
this explains very little, for the term "nature" again 
means everything. But you understand or recognize 
more when you ascertain that the uncouth thing is 
dead or alive, wall paper or garment, man or animal. 
You will notice that in this intellectual enlightenment 
it is simply a matter of classification, of the head under 
which the mystery should be classed. To classify the 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 251 

phenomena of truth and life, means to understand, to 
use the intellect, to enlighten the brain. 

But we must well consider how far we shall have to 
go in our classification in order to find the place in the 
system which will fully clarify and determine understand- 
ing. Suppose that in the above mentioned case you have 
ascertained that the motion is due to a cat, then the inquir- 
ing faculty of understanding has not yet reached the end 
of its tether. The next question is then, whether it is 
your cat or that of your neighbor, whether it is black, 
white, or grey, young or old. And when you finally recog- 
nize that it is your tomcat Peter, you must remember that 
the subject which understands as well as the object to be 
recognized, being parts of the absolute, are absolutely and 
infinitely divisible parts, which are never fully understood 
and never fully exhausted. 

Please remember that in speaking of something un- 
couth, we are not so much concerned in Peter or Tabby, 
but in the intellect which we desire to understand so that 
we may make a correct use of it. And I refer to it as un- 
couth merely because its understanding is beset with so 
many difficulties. When I compared it in the preceding 
letter with a photographic apparatus which should fur- 
nish us with pictures, and in likening it now to an instru- 
ment designed to distinguish things by classification, I 
warn you not to be confused thereby. Classification is 
most essential as a means of producing intellectual pic- 
tures. In this connection I emphasize once more that the 
faculty of understanding, the same as other things, is not 
independent by itself, but can accomplish something only 
in the universal interconnection. The understanding that 
the phenomenon quoted above belongs to the category of 
tomcats, and more especially into the column labeled 



252 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

Peter, would not be any understanding at all, if you had 
not become previously acquainted with the mouse-de- 
vouring race and individual in question. Only in connec- 
tion with your previous experience is the understanding 
that this tomcat and the uncouth motion are one and the 
same thing, or belong to the same category, a true under- 
standing. 

Ludwig Feuerbach says: A talented writer is recog- 
nized by the fact that he assumes talent on the part of the 
reader also and does not chew up his subject into minute 
parts like a petty schoolmaster. On the other hand, it 
seems to me that it is possible to assume too much, and I 
pursued a schoolmasterly course in this case, because the 
subject is new to you and still leaves plenty of room for 
reflection. 

I wanted to show by a commonplace example what I 
mean by insight and understanding and how by means of 
it the unknown and uncouth becomes known and familiar. 
True, the understanding in this case was illumined by pre- 
vious experience, while you are after new knowledge. 
You want to know how enlightenment arises in order to 
acquire new insight. Now, all novelty has the dialectic 
quality of being at the same time something antiquated. 
New understanding can be acquired only by the help of 
old understanding. In other words, old and new 
understanding, which I define here as the faculty of clas- 
sification, have their existence only in the total interde- 
pendence of the universal existence. 

You must discard the old prejudice that knowledge 
can be collected like cents. Although this is well enough, 
it does not suffice for the purpose of logical thinking. One 
science belongs to another, and all of them together be- 
long to one class with the entire universe. It will be ap- 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 253 

parent to you, then, that at the beginning of your young 
days your knowledge has not sprouted all at once, but has 
come out of the unknown. And what is true of you, is 
true of the whole human race. In its cradle it was with- 
out intellect. It had, indeed, the germ. But do not 
beasts, worms, and sensitive plants have that also? In 
short, the light of perception and understanding is noth- 
ing new in the radical sense of the word, but connected 
with the old and with the world in general, and of the 
same kind. All our knowledge must be connected and 
combined into one understanding, one system, one realm, 
and this is the realm of reality, of truth, of life. 

Systematic classification is the task of logic. The first 
requirement for this purpose is the awakened conscious- 
ness of the indivisibility of the universe, of its universal 
unity. This consciousness is, in other words, at the same 
time the recognition of the merely formal significance of 
all scientific classification. 

The unity of the universe is true, and is the sole and 
innate truth. That this sole world truth is full of differ- 
ences, is just as absolutely different as absolutely the same, 
does no more contradict a reasonable unity and equality 
than there is any contradiction in the fact that the various 
owls have different faces and still the same owl face. 

Aristotle divided the sense into five parts, anthropolo- 
gists the race of man into five races, natural philosophers 
the space into three dimensions. It is now a question of 
showing to you that such a division, however true and 
just, is nevertheless far from being truth and justice, but 
is merely classification. The fundamental requirement of 
logic is to designate scientific classifications as that which 
they are, viz., mental operations. It is the business of the 
intellect to make classifications. That is its characteristic 



254 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

quality and does not contradict the indivisible truth in the 
least. 

Old wiseacres teach that a reasonable man must not 
contradict himself, and this is a wise, though very narrow, 
lesson. Hegel maintains that everything in the world is 
reasonable, hence the contradictions are also. Under this 
conservative exterior there is hidden a very revolutionary 
perception of which the "destructive" minds take advan- 
tage in order to flatly contradict the wiseacres and their 
stable, dead, disordered order which cannot stand any con- 
tradiction. 

Reason dissolves all contradictions and opposition into 
harmony by logical classification. "Everything in its own 
time and place." If it does not wish to be called unreason, 
reason must rise to the understanding that its opposite is 
only a formal antagonism. It must know that God and 
the world, body and soul, life and death, motion and rest, 
and whatever else the dualists may distinguish, are two 
and yet one. Then it becomes clear that the conservatives 
are the real revolutionaries, because by their senseless 
adherence to the "good old. order" they drive the prole- 
tariat to desperation, until it upsets that order. On the 
other hand, the maligned revolutionaries are conservative, 
because they subordinate themselves to the world's evolu- 
tionary process which was, is, and will be eternal. 

The red thread winding through all these letters deals 
with the following points : The instrument of thought is a 
thing like all other common things, a part or attribute of 
the universe. It belongs particularly to the general cate- 
gory of being and is an apparatus which produces a de- 
tailed picture of human experience by categorical classi- 
fication or distinction. In order to use this apparatus cor- 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 355 

rectly, one must fully grasp the fact that the world unit 
is multiform and that all multiformity is a unit. 

It is the solution of the riddle of the ancient Eleatic 
philosophy : How can the one be contained in the many, 
and the many in one ? 



FOURTEENTH LETTER 

Shoemaking and beet culture are as much sciences as 
physics, chemistry, and astronomy. Reading, writing, 
and reckoning are called elementary knowledge, and 
though I do not deny that they have an elementary value 
for the culture of the mind, yet I can truly say that I have 
met well-informed people who could neither read nor 
write. I wish to indicate by this that there are indeed 
high and low degrees of knowledge and science, but that 
such graduations have only a temporary, local, relative, 
subjective significance, while in the absolute all things are 
the same. 

The scorn with which you may hear some people 
speak of the night of the absolute in which all cats are 
grey and all women beautiful Helenas shall not prevent us 
from repeatedly studying the absolute which I have again 
and again praised as the main topic of logic. Only re- 
member, please, that you must not have any mystic idea 
of it. The absolute is the sum total of all that was, is, 
and will be. 

The subjects as well as the objects of all science be- 
long to the absolute, which is commonly called "world." 

All other sciences have for their object limited parts, 
relative matters, while the science of the mind treats of 
all things, of the infinite. This is a point to which I refer 



256 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

frequently because it tends to make my lessons obscure. 
I am lecturing on the science of the intellect, but I speak 
of all things, of the universe, because I am obliged to de- 
monstrate, not the relation of the mind to shoemaking or 
astronomy, but its general interrelations. I have to make 
plain its general conduct, and this leads necessarily to 
the all-embracing generality, to the absolute. We wish 
to learn the art of thinking, not on this or that subject, 
but the art of general world thought. 

The intellect is a special part, the same as every other 
scientific or practical object. But it is that part which is 
not satisfied with piece work, which knows that it itself 
and all special things are attributes or predicates of the 
absolute subject, that it itself and all things are univer- 
sally interrelated. 

The human mind is sometimes called self-conscious- 
ness. But this name is too limited for such an unlimited 
thing, for the pathfinder of the infinite, for your, my, and 
every other consciousness of the world and of existence in 
general. 

For centuries the question has been discussed whether 
there are innate ideas hidden in the intellect or whether 
it may be likened to a blank paper which experience im- 
pregnates with knowledge. This is the question after the 
origin and source of understanding. Whence comes rea- 
son, where do we get our ideas, judgments, conclusions? 
By the help of brown-study from the interior of our brain, 
from revelation, or from experience ? It seems to me that 
you will quickly decide this matte, when I ask you to con- 
sider that everything we experience, together with the in- 
tellect going through experiences, is a revelation of the 
absolute. Everything we know is experience. We may 
consider the mind as a sheet of blank paper, but in order 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 257 

that it may receive writing on its surface this internal 
paperis as necessary as the external world which produces 
the hand, the pen and the ink for this process of writing. 
In other words, all experience originates from the world 
organism. Not knowledge, but consciousness, world con- 
sciousness, is innate in the intellect. It has not the con- 
sciousness of this or that in itself, but it knows of itself 
the general, the existence as such, the absolute. 

The science of the intellect has ever wrestled with one 
peculiar fact. It found knowledge which the mind had re- 
ceived from the outside, so-called empirical knowledge. 
But it also found knowledge which was innate, so-called 
a priori knowledge. That there is always a valley be- 
tween two mountains, that gold is not sheet iron, that the 
part is smaller than the whole, that the angles of a triangle 
are together equal to two right angles, that circles are 
round, that water is wet, that fire is hot, etc., these are 
things of which we know that they are true in heaven and 
in hell, and in all time to come, although we have never 
seen there with our experience. This plainly shows that we 
harbor a secret in our brains which the lovers of the mys- 
tical seek to exploit by making believe that their self-inter- 
ested wisdom of God and high authority likewise belongs 
to the eternally innate truths. For this reason it is es- 
pecially important for the proletariat to bring the contro- 
versy of the origin and source of understanding to a close. 

Our logic asks : Does wisdom descend mysteriously 
from the interior of the human brain, or does it come from 
the outer world like all experience? We shall leave its 
descent from heaven out of the question. 

The answer is : Science, perception, understanding, 
thought, require internal and external things, subject and 



258 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

object, brain and world. Truth is here and truth is there. 
Truth is so divine that it is everywhere and absolute, . 

But how to explain that wonderful a priori knowl- 
edge which exceeds all experience? For it is a fact that 
the intellect has not alone the faculty of knowing things 
in general, but also that of separating them into their 
parts and from one another and to name them. It cuts 
off slices, so to say. But not like the butcher who sees 
everything merely from the standpoint of his trade. You 
will remember from your own experience as well as from 
my repeated statements that the world is not a monoto- 
nous, but a multiform unit. This confused knot is dis- 
solved and explained by intellectual separation, by classi- 
fication. In the absolute everything is alike and unlike. 
But the intellect makes abstractions from the unlike. For 
instance, in conceiving of the term minerals, we pass over 
the distinction between gold and sheet iron. Then, when 
we continue the classification by subordinating gold and 
sheet iron as separate species to the general term of min- 
erals, we know very well that gold and sheet iron are dif- 
ferent kinds of the same general mineral nature. We 
know what the names indicate, and so long as they retain 
their meaning, we know that neither in heaven nor in hell 
can gold be sheet iron or sheet iron be gold.- Water and 
fire are specialties taken from the universe and named. 
Is it a wonder, then, that these names have a special 
meaning and that we have the settled conviction that 
wherever sense instead of nonsense is master, fire burns, 
water wets, circles are round, and the sum of the angles 
of every triangle is equal to two right angles? 

These illustrations are commonplace enough, indeed, 
but it seems to me that they clearly show the mere for- 
mality of the distinction between innate and experienced 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 259 

knowledge. You will recognize that both of these kinds of 
knowledge are different and yet of the same kind, that 
both are mixtures of the internal and external. Knowl- 
edge a priori ceases to be a miracle when we understand 
that it comes out of the same fountain of experience as a 
posteriori knowledge, and in either case knowledge is ac- 
quired only by means of the intellect. Hence intellect 
connected with the world is the sole source of all wisdom, 
and external nature as well as our internal faculty of un- 
derstanding are parts of the one general nature, which is 
the truth and the absolute. 

"Only a gradual, slow, gapless development," says 
Noire, "can free the thinking mind from the philo- 
sophical disease of wondering." 

The art of dialectics or logic which teaches that the 
universe, or the whole world, is one being, is the science 
of absolute evolution. "In the whole constitution of all 
natural things," writes Lazare Geiger, "there is hardly 
anything more miraculous than the way in which the 
miracle avoids our glance and continuously withdraws 
into the distance to escape observation. In the place of 
the abrupt and strange things produced by imagination, 
reason puts uniformity and transition." 

And we add that the science of reason, or logic, 
teaches simultaneously with the unity of the whole world, 
also that all things are alike miraculous, or that there is 
only one miracle, which is existence in general, the ab- 
solute. In other words, everything and nothing is mi- 
raculous. 

In demonstrating that the most different things, such 
as heat and cold, and all radical distinctions, are only rela- 
tive forms of universal nature, I prove the uninterrupted 



260 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

and matter of fact transition and the absolute gradually, 
the fusion, of all things. 

I have tried to establish this proof in regard to the two 
kinds of knowledge and illustrated it with commonplace 
examples, because these have a popularizing effect. In 
order to meet the demands of more exacting minds, I 
shall presently take up the miracle of causality. The in- 
dubitable statement that everything must have its cause 
is regarded as the most miraculous innate knowledge, and 
is much misused for the purpose of bringing confusion 
into logic. 



FIFTEENTH LETTER 

My Son : 

If on my return from some voyage I were to tell you 
of all the things I have not seen, you would justly doubt 
the order of my senses. Sane reason demands that the 
description of unfamiliar things be given in a positive, 
not in a negative manner. If that is so, is it not wrong to 
proceed negatively by trying to prove in explaining the 
nature of the intellect that it is not a miracle and no mys- 
terious charm of wisdom ? I answer : No. For the pres- 
ent, the intellect is still a sort of ignis fatuus which is 
magnified into a fiery man. In order to understand the 
ignis fatuus, it is necessary to remove the fiery man. 
Logic must show that human reason is not a miracle, not 
a mystical receptacle of wisdom. The negative process is 
in such a case positively in order. Wherever a thing is 
obscured by prejudices, these must first be removed, in 
order that room may be made for the bare fact. 

It was the famous Kant who posed the question: 
"How is a priori knowledge possible?" How do we ar- 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 261 

rive at the knowledge of things which are not accessible to 
experience? The answer is that the intellect cannot ac- 
complish such a miracle, and Kant substantiates this in 
a long-winded way and with admirable penetration. But 
he leit a nasty hair in the soup. ' 

He found that by the help of our reason we can ex- 
plain only phenomena. The confusion between truth and 
phenomena had been handed down to him as an infirmity 
of ancient times. He worked diligently on its solution, 
but left some work for those coming after him. Origin- 
ally the study of supernatural and the profane study of 
natural things were closely intermingled. Not until the 
obvious results of natural science became known, did 
thinkers accommodate themselves to the habit of leaving 
supernatural things to faith and limiting science to the 
study of natural phenomena. Science had so to say passed 
on to the practical order of business, not paying any 
further attention to the contrast between phenomena and 
truth. But the logic, which is innate in the human 
mind, cannot content itself with the dualistic split be- 
tween faith and science. It demands a monistic system 
and does not desist until the primeval forests of faith 
are completely put under cultivation. 

The logical impulse of culture caused Kant to con- 
tinue what was begun by Socrates. Philosophy before Soc- 
crates searched for truth externally. While our logic 
teaches that everything is true, and truth is the universe, 
the Ionic philosophers made a sort of fetish out of the 
matter. Thales idolized the water as the thing of things, 
another the fire, a third numbers. This worship of the 
fetish was the worship of truth. The search for under- 
standing starts out with misunderstanding From religi- 
ous to scientific culture, it is a step, not a leap. When 



262 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

Socrates turned to introspection and started out, with his 
"Know thyself," in submitting the prodigy of the human 
soul to critique, he made another important step. 

You know that the "wisest of men" was not inter- 
ested in air and water, in natural science of the strict or- 
der, but rather in the good, the true, and the beautiful, 
in the human in the narrower sense, in the realm of the 
spirit, in the soul. It was indeed unwise that he was in- 
terested to the verge of idolization, since in consequence 
of this interest in a special part, the other, the material 
part was being neglected. According to Goethe's state- 
ment that one thing is not fit for all, Socrates did right. 
He and all philosophical lights after him studied the in- 
tellect. What they missed was the now dawning under- 
standing that the faculty of thought is not a prodigy but 
a special, and at the same time common, part of universal 
nature. While these philosophers looked for truth in 
any one special form of excellence, you are now invited to 
look for it in the total interrelation of things. 

Science has ever endeavored to do away with miracles 
and prodigies. This could be accomplished only gradu- 
ally, and the logicians have, therefore, remained more or 
less biased and confused. The great Kant was no excep- 
tion. He looked for supreme truth, and for its sake he 
investigated the intellect. He is celebrated because he 
explained so well that this intellect feels no mission for 
anything transcendental, and cannot understand anything 
but phenomena. Still he permitted something transcen- 
dental to remain. 

Kant is of the opinion that we perceive things as 
they appear, but not as they are "in themselves." Never- 
theless we should believe that a mysterious truth is at 
the bottom of those phenomena, because we should other- 



LETTERS ON LOGIB 263 

wise arrive at the irreconcilable contradiction that there 
are phenomena without anything which could appear. 
The intellect, he holds, can operate only on the field of 
phenomena, and for this reason we should give up the 
endless grubbing after the transcendental. But we should 
leave one little room in the house of reason, one little 
chamber of faith, which points beyond experience up to the 
point where a mysterious truth guards God and His 
commands. 

The subsequent philosophers, especially the Hegelian 
philosophy, opposed this separation which assigned to the 
intellect only the study of phenomena and to faith the ab- 
solute and infinite for veneration, But they did not yet 
succeed in completely mastering the matter, they did not 
fully arrive at an indubitably clear exposition of the foun- 
tain of understanding and of the unity of truth, so that 
reaction nowadays can again sound the retreat after the 
melody : "Back to Kant." You know that Lessing com- 
plained about the treatment of "a dead dog" accorded to 
Spinoza, and Marx added pointedly : "Hegel is more 
of a dead dog to-day than Spinoza was at Lessing's time." 
The enemies of the working class are the enemies of evo- 
lution. They wish to preserve the existing order of 
things and the good old time in which they feel at home. 
For this reason it is the mission of the proletariat to con- 
tinue the work of logic. It is our duty to show clearly 
that the metaphysical truth which Kant opposed to the 
phenomena of nature and could not eliminate from the in- 
tellect, is nothing but just a metaphysical, a fantastically 
exaggerated, thing. 

According to our logic, the universe is the truth and 
everything partakes of it. That such a truth is logical 
and such a logic true, is shown by the interconnection of 



26-i LETTERS ON LOGIC 

things, so that this science is applicable to everything 
which the sciences respect as reasonable and true. 

In order to help you in the understanding of the ab- 
solute and liberate your thought from all special miracles, 
I refer to Kant's critique of reason. It teaches that our 
intellect becomes a source of understanding only in con- 
nection with other phenomena of nature. Only his 
critique stuck fast in the mysterious fountain of causality. 
Thus he showed that he was only a seeker after logic, not 
its master. The conclusion that there must be something 
that does appear where there are phenomena is certainly 
correct. But" that which Kant was thinking of, something 
of a transcendental or metaphysical nature, led him to the 
radically wrong conclusion that there must be something 
different, peculiar, miraculous, mysterious, wherever there 
are phenomena. 

The Kantian conclusion that there must be an absolute 
truth by itself behind a phenomenon, an absolute truth 
that exists independent of and disconnected with such 
phemenon, was due to his fetish-like conception of truth. 
It is the first requirement for a correct use of the faculty 
of logical reasoning to know that truth is the common na- 
ture of the universe. 

That a phenomenon must be based on nature, or an 
effect on a cause, is a fact identical with "causality" which 
I already promised to discuss in the preceding letter. 
This same problem may also be expressed in the words: 
Where there are predicates, there must be a subject that 
carries them. In order to make quite sure that I will not 
be misunderstood, I emphasize once more the fact that I 
am not raising any doubt as to the correctness of this 
conclusion, but only to the metaphysical application of 
this conclusion after the Kantian manner which consists 



LETTERS ON LOGIC £t>0 

in making the same use of it as a clergyman who tries to 
prove that his theology is innate in reason. 

Our conception of logic wishes to show that all causes 
and effects are matter of the same kind, and that our 
faculty of reasoning is a matter of fact thing which 
brooks no mysteries or metaphysical dreams. 



SIXTEENTH LETTER 



Now let me illustrate the interconnection of all things, 
or the world-unit, by discussing the question of causality. 
We know that everything has its cause. We know that 
this is also true on the Moon or on Uranus, although we 
have not acquired this knowledge by experience on those 
world bodies. Thus it seemed that the intellect was a 
mysterious receptacle containing innate wisdom. The 
same receptacle also contains, for instance, the truth that 
all white horses are white and all black horses black. We 
do not know anything about the color of other horses in 
other countries, but the color of black and white horses 
we know even if we have never seen them in other coun- 
tries. It is thus apparent that our intellect is an instru- 
ment which reaches beyond experience. For this reason 
there would seem to be no telling where the supply of 
such miraculous revelations would stop and into what 
mysterious worlds the intellect passing beyond the limits 
of experience would lead us. 

In order that the human intellect may not appear 
transcendental, in order to give it its place in the general 
classification of natural forces, we must investigate the 
nature of causality and so-called a priori knowledge. 



266 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

Kindly observe in the first place that a thing is just as 
wonderful after it is explained as it was before its ex- 
planation. A scientific explanation of a thing ought not 
to do away with our admiration, but only to reduce it to 
reasonable bounds. The intellect may very well be re- 
garded as something wonderful, but its wondrous quality 
should be reduced to the measure of all things which are 
none of them any less wonderful. After you have ex- 
plained what water is, after you have learned that it is 
composed of two chemical elements, after you have real- 
ized all its qualities thoroughly, it still remains a wonder- 
ful, divine, fluid. 

"All things have their causes." What are all things? 
They are attributes, qualities of the universe. It is innate 
in the intellect to know that the world is one thing, that 
all things belong, not to any different thing, but to one 
and the same subject. The intellect is by nature the abso- 
lute feeling of unity. It knows of itself that everything 
is interrelated and that the consciousness of causality is 
nothing'else but the consciousness of cosmic interrelation. 
And I maintain that the innateness of the consciousness of 
cosmic interrelation in our brain is explained when we 
realize that it is an actual thing like all others, a phenom- 
enon which has the same general nature as every other 
phenomenon.* 

The fact is undeniable that a certain knowledge is in- 
nate in our consciousness. The only difficulty has been 
to explain this fact. At this point I call your attention to 
the exaggerated notion entertained in regard to explain- 
ing, and understanding, things. By explanations, a thing 
is not dissolved, but only classified. 

The hatching of an egg is explained when you per- 



*e. g. That of natural existence. — Editor. 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 267 

ceive that this process is part and parcel of a whole 
class of similar processes. If you modify the exalted 
idea of the effect of explanations in this sense, you must 
realize that the innate consciousness of the general in- 
terrelation of things is natural and intelligible and re- 
quires no other explanation than the humidity of the 
water, the gravity of bodies, or the color of black horses. 

Even after it has been explained and understood, the 
intellect with its logic remains a wonderful thing. Just 
as clay is by its nature untransparent and pliable, or glass 
transparent and brittle, so consciousness has its peculiar 
innate qualities. In this way knowledge comes to the in- 
tellect not only by experience, but it is also a sort of re- 
ceptacle full of wisdom. Still this receptacle would no 
more contain wisdom without experience than the eye 
would have impressions without light. 

In order to straighten out the intricate windings of 
our subject, I recapitulate them. We wish to learn the 
proper use of our intellect, the conscious application of 
consciousness. To this end we analyze its hitherto hidden 
mystical nature. So long as we exalt this nature trans- 
cendentally to the clouds, we do not acquire its proper 
use. Therefore the first paragraph of our lesson reads: 
The intellect belongs in the same category with all things 
of the universe. And the second paragraph says : If we 
distinguish two classes of thought radiated by the human 
intellect, viz., innate thoughts, such as causality, and on 
the other hand thoughts which come through experience, 
we must remember that such a distinction is correct only 
when we realize that in spite of this classification in two 
kinds they really belong to the same kind. Innate and 
acquired wisdom, though served on two different plates, 
still are taken from the same general world dish. 



268 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

From this it follows that the science of causality, 
though applicable to all the phenomena of the world, does 
not apply to the universe. If it is a fact that all wisdom 
is worldly, then one must not fly outside of the world with 
the concept of causality. 

This is the salient point at issue. 

All things are one thing, are interdependent, stand 
in the relation of cause and effect toward one another, or 
of genus and species. To say that all things have a cause 
means that they have a mother. The fact that every 
mother has a mother finds its final ending in the world 
mother or mother world, which is absolute and mother- 
less and contains all mothers in its womb. 

Causes are mothers, effects are daughters. Every 
daughter has not only a mother, grand-mother, and great- 
grand-mother, but also a father, grand-father, and great- 
grand-father. The origin, or the family relationship, of 
a daughter is not one-sided, but all-sided. In the same 
way all things have not one, but many causes which flow 
together in the general cause. 

The intellect which has the innate knowledge that 
everything has its cause will accept the teaching that all 
causes in the world are founded in the absolute world 
cause anad must return to it. It is the quintessence of 
logic not only to ascertain the true nature of the intellect, 
but also to elucidate the nature of the universe by the 
help of the intellect. 

All things have a mother, but to expect that the world 
mother should logically have a mother is to carry logic 
to extremities and to misunderstand the intellect and its 
art of reasoning. 

If you have recognized the faculty of understanding 
as a part of existence, you will not wonder at its miracu- 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 269 

lousness. Existence is wonderful. Its parts arise one out 
of the other, out of the universal interrelations of the one 
world. They all have their predecessors and causes. But 
what is true of the relative parts, is not true of the abso- 
lute whole. 

I am the son of my father and the father of my son, 
I am at the same time father and son. In the same way 
all things are simultaneously cause and effect. Although 
father and son are two different persons, still the capacity 
of being father and son rest in the same person, and al- 
though cause and effect are to be distinguished as two 
things, still they are two relations of the same thing. 
Persons and things, causes and effects, are not indepen- 
dent entities, but relative entities, are interconnections or 
relations of the absolute. 

The intellect is innate in us, and with it and through 
it also the consciousness of being, although it is innate in 
us only as the teeth of the child which grow after birth. 
Everything that we become aware of is known only as a 
part of the universe. In so far as this is wonderful, the 
consciousness of causality is miraculous. But, in fact, 
the knowledge of the causality of all things is innate wis- 
dom the same as that of the color of all white and black 
horses. At the same time it must be observed that every 
innate knowledge is in part acquired, and every acquired 
knowledge in part innate, so that both kinds intermingle 
and form one category. 

My whole argument aims to convince you that all 
things are worldly things, and their causality is only an- 
other name for the same thing, just as the German brot 
is called pain in French and bread in English. Thus we 
derive the firm conviction that if there is pain in heaven 
there will be bread, and if there are things, there will be 



27 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

causes and effects, or interrelation with the unit of ex- 
istence. 

The mystery of causality is sometimes expressed by 
the statement that we possess the indubitable knowledge 
which extends beyond all experience that wherever a 
change takes place there must have preceded another 
change. Indeed, we have the faculty of recognizing the 
unity in the infinite multiplicity, and infinite multiplicity 
in the unity. Multiplicity, change, motion — who is to 
split hairs about them, who will make fine distinctions? 
The intellect is the photographic organ of the infinite mo- 
tion and transformations called the "world." It is and 
possesses the consciousness of cosmic changes. Is it a 
wonder that it knows that there is interrelation in its 
things, that no part of the world, not a particle of its mo- 
tion and transformations, stands alone by itself, that 
everything is connected and mutually dependent in and 
with the universe? Because this understanding is in a 
way innate in the intellect, therefore it understands that 
there is nothing but change, infinitely proceeding trans- 
formations. And if it detaches any single thing from this 
process, it knows that changes preceded it and changes 
will follow. 

In short, we must not marvel at any single part of 
nature, not even at the intellect, but admire the whole 
universe. Then fetishism will at last end and a true cult, 
the cult of world truth, can begin. 

The art of thinking, my dear Eugene, is not so easy. 
For this reason I keep on warning you against misunder- 
standing. I do not mean to advise you with the forego- 
ing against admiring any single part of nature, or of art, 
a landscape or a statue. My teaching merely tends to 
moderate admiration by the reflection that the whole 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 271 

world is wonderful, that everything is beautiful, so that 
nothing ugly remains. The distinction between beautiful 
and ugly is only relative. Even when I say that the true 
worship of God, the cult of truth, cannot begin until idol 
worship ceases, you will appreciate the phrase and will 
not insinuate that I do not value the cultivation of science 
in the past, or that I hate idol worship to the extent of 
forgetting what I have emphasized repeatedly, viz., that 
idol worship is also worship of God, and error a paving 
stone on the way toward truth. The most minute thing 
is a magnitude. Everything is true, good, and beautiful, 
for the universe is absolute truth, beauty and goodness. 
I conclude with the words of Fr. von Sallet : 

A sunny view of world and life 

Is balm for brain and heart, 
It is with health and beauty rife, 

With noblest works of art. 
But do not for a moment think 
That it is captured in a wink. 
The golden harvest does not grow, 
Unless the early tempests blow. 
And only bitter woe and strain 
Will bright and lofty wisdom gain. 



SEVENTEENTH LETTER. 



My subject, dear Eugene, is the simplest in the world, 
but it requires thorough treatment for all its full under- 
standing. So every letter is in a way but a repetition of 
the same argument. "It is remarkable," says Schopen- 



272 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

hauer, "that we find the few main theses of pre-socratic 
philosophy repeated innumerable times. Also in the 
works of modern thinkers, such as Cartesius, Spinoza, 
Leibniz, and even Kant, we find that their few main 
theses are repeated over and over." 

Now I ask you to consider what I said in my first let- 
ters, viz., that the titles of the principal philosophical 
works reveal that philosophy is engaged in the study of 
logic, in the analysis of the intellect and the art of its use. 
You will then recognize that in the very nature of the 
subject my presentation of the matter lacks systematiza- 
tion. It has no real beginning and end, because its object, 
the intellect, is interconnected with the whole universe, 
which is without beginning and end, which has neither 
before nor after, neither above nor below. 

You may venture that the relation of the intellect to 
the universe does not concern the intellect especially, but 
is a universal matter. That would be true. 

But it is easy to show that the art of thinking and wis- 
dom of the world are identical. And although the uni- 
versal interrelation of things is germain to all things and 
subjects, yet its consideration is a special task of logic 
which treats all objects of thought summarily. 

My subject therefore begins everywhere, even 
though it is a specialty. Hence I take the liberty to 
take my departure from any literature which I happen 
to study. In the present letter, I deal with "logical 
investigations" of the prominent Professor Trendelen- 
burg. His is a bulky volume, but you need not fear 
that I shall weary you with its subtleties. As a rule I 
read only the preface of philosophical works of the 
second and third order, their introduction and per- 
haps the first few chapters. Then I am approximately 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 273 

informed as to what I may expect from them further 
on. One frequently finds statements which, if they 
do not throw new light on the subject, still bring out 
in bolder relief some of the accomplishments of his- 
torical research in our field. And in order that the son 
may not trust to the father alone, which might lead 
to distrust, I connect my argument with some state- 
ments of Trendelenburg. 

In the preface to the second edition the author 
complains of the "dull headache" which the Hegelian 
intoxication has left in Germany and says : "'Phi- 
losophy will not resume its old power until it be- 
comes consistent, and it will not become consistent 
until it grows in the same way that all other sciences 
do. In other words, it must not take a new departure 
in every brain and then quit, but it must approach its 
problems historically and develop them. The German 
prejudice must be abandoned, according to which the 
philosophy of the future is supposed to look for a new 
principle. This principle has already been found. It 
consists in the organic world conception, the funda- 
ments of which are resting in Plato and Aristotle." 

The Professor is right, but he overlooks that the 
philosophers, even of modern times, do not begin 
"each on his own account," do not have "each his own 
principle," or if they have, such a "false originality" 
is but the indifferent attribute of historical develop- 
ment which has handed the object of logic, the true 
art of thought, from generation to generation in an 
ever brighter condition. 

I repeat this emphatically for pedagogic reasons, 
because I consider it essential to convince you and the 
reader that the apparent paradoxes which I state are 



274 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

the objects of discussion since time immemorial. I 
also wish to stimulate you to a study of the master 
works of philosophy which show the cheering spec- 
tacle, in the persons of the most brilliant specimens of 
the human mind, of the onward march of this mind 
from darkness to light. 

In order that the wheat contained in this human treas- 
ure box may not be concealed by the tares, I am endeavor- 
ing to throw light on the outcome of the historical devel- 
opment of philosophy, and for this purpose I continue to 
discuss the question by taking my departure in this in- 
stance from some further statements of Trendelenburg. 

"It is a peculiarity of philosophical methods of rea- 
soning to recognize a part in the whole, and it is tacitly 
assumed that the whole is descended from a thought 
which determines the parts. On the other hand, it is pecu- 
liar to empirical methods of analysis to study the parts 
without regard to their interrelation, or at best to collect 
them and put them together, and it is tacitly assumed that 
every point is something peculiar in itself which must be 
studied apart from all the rest." 

"The aim of all human understanding is always to 
solve the miracle of divine creation by further creative 
thought. When this task is undertaken in detail, the de- 
tail study forces one on to other things ; for things must 
go backwards toward their dissolution by the same force 
through which they arose out of the depths." 

These sentences state the problem before us. Shall 
we use the intellect philosophically, or shall we use it 
empirically? We are striving to understand the parts 
and the whole, and this is identical with the research after 
a systematical world philosophy, or with the art of dia- 
lectics. 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 275 

Now we must state in the first place that thinking of 
any kind, whether it be philosophical or empirical, is of 
the same species, that the same kernel is contained in both 
forms. Roses are different flowers from carnations, but 
the flower nature is in both of them. Thus the nature of 
thought is contained in both philosophical and empirical 
thinking. The distinction is well enough, but their unity 
must not be lost sight of. 

The philosophers, he says, seek to understand the de- 
tail by the whole; the empirical thinkers analyze the 
details without regard to interrelations. But both methods 
of research are different specimens of the same genus, and 
both of them are one-sided when their interconnection is 
overlooked. The empirical thinker who seeks to under- 
stand the details in their isolation, thinks philosophically, 
when he regards his special research as a contribution to 
the whole, and the philosopher, who seeks to understand 
the detail by the whole, thinks empirically when he rightly 
regards all details as attributes of the whole. 

Trendelenburg, then, has expressed his case very 
obscurely. Both methods of stud)', if employed one- 
sidedly, entirely misconceive the art of thinking. The 
philosophers err when they regard the intellect as the only 
source of understanding and truth ; it is only a part of 
truth and must be supplemented by all the rest of the 
world. On the other hand, the empirical thinkers err 
when they look for understanding and truth exclusively 
in the outer world, without taking into account the intel- 
lectual instrument by the help of which they lift their 
treasures. In fact, such one-sided philosophers exist only 
in theory ; I mean there are some who imagine that truth 
could be one-sided. But in practice they all testify, much 
against their will, to the inevitable interconnection of mat- 



276 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

ter and mind, of inside and outside. In the practical use 
of the intellect everybody shows that the part operates 
in the whole, and that the whole is active in its parts. 

We know a priori that the universe is a whole. The 
universal existence can be conceived only as of one kind 
or nature. The mere thought that there might be some- 
thing which does not partake of the nature of the universe 
is no thought, because it is a thought without sense or 
reason. The whole world is the supreme being, though I 
grant that we have but a vague conception of it. We 
have as yet no detailed, true, conception of the universe, 
but it is gradually acquired in the course of science. Still, 
our conception will never be perfect because details are 
infinitesimal and the absolute being is infinite growth. 

As to details, we know them more or less accurately 
and yet not accurately, because even the most minute part 
of the infinite is infinite. All science has searched in vain 
for atoms. What our understanding knows, has always 
been nothing but predicates or attributes of truth, 
although they are true attributes and are truly understood 
by us. 

I emphasize the inadequacy of all modes of thought 
and of all understanding in opposition to those who make 
an idol of science. I emphasize the truth of all perceptions 
in opposition to those knownothings who claim that truth 
cannot be understood, but can only be admired and. 
worshipped. Hence it follows for our theory of under- 
standing that intellect and reason and the art of thought 
are no independent treasure boxes which make any reve- 
lations to us. They are theoretical classifications which in 
practice are operative only in the universal interconnection 
of things. Understanding, perceiving, judging, distin- 
guishing and concluding, etc., are unable to produce any 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 271 

truths. They can only enlighten and clarify experience 
by logical classification and distinction. Because man 
produces works which are preceded by planning, there- 
fore the philosophical mode of research has "assumed 
that the whole is descended from a thought." But this 
is an assumption of human origin, which is shown to be 
without foundation on closer analysis. The plans of our 
works are copies of natural originals and are "free crea- 
tions of the mind" only in a limited sense. The artists 
are well aware of the natural descent of their thoughts 
and fictions. To regard the world as the outcome of 
thought is a perverse logic. It is the first condition of 
rational, proletarian, thought to recognize the intellect 
and its products as attributes of the world subject. 



EIGHTEENTH LETTER 

Just as in political history action and reaction follow 
one another, just as periods of economic prosperity are 
alternated by periods of depression, so we find in litera- 
ture a periodical flucuation between philosophical and 
anti-philosophical tendencies. 

After Hegel had for a time thoroughly aroused the 
spirits, a time of apathy followed, so that this hero of 
thought who shortly before had been almost idolized could 
be attacked and reviled. For about a decade, a philo- 
sophical breeze has now once more been blowing. The 
subject of logic, the theory of understanding, is again the 
object of universal attention. This movement is stimu- 
lated by important discoveries in science, such as the heat 
equivalent of Robert Mayer, the origin of species by Dar- 



278 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

win, etc., and natural science and philosophy may be com- 
pared to two miners who are digging a tunnel, so that 
sharp ears on both sides can hear the blows of the ham- 
mers and the clanging of the tools. 

There is much truth in this picture, but it may also 
lead to misunderstandings. By the vivisection of frogs 
and rabbits, by boring into the brain, physiology will not 
discover the mind. No microscope, no telescope, will 
reveal the nature of reason and truth or the art of logical 
discernment; 

Neither will Lazarre Geiger, Max Miiller, Steinthal, 
and Noire succeed in philology in solving the "last ques- 
tions of all knowledge" by the help of any primitive arch- 
language. 

At the same time, the value of the co-operation of 
these gentlemen is not denied, only I desire to point out 
that the comparison with the tunnel is not quite accurate. 
What Marx said of economic formulas, is true of logical 
formulas: "In their analysis neither the microscope nor 
chemical reagents are of any service. The power of 
abstraction must replace them both." 

The two sciences will finally meet, not because each 
one of them digs away in its own one-sided fashion, but 
because the miners meet after working hours and ex- 
change their experiences. And the philosophers may be 
the dominant party, because they are specialists in logic 
and therefore prepared to utilize anything which may 
serve their purpose, no matter from what side it comes. 
The other party, on the other hand, has its own specialties 
and promotes the cause of logic in a secondary and invol- 
untary fashion. 

Natural science has its own .monism which is dis- 
tinguished from philosophical proletarian monism in that 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 279 

it does not appreciate the historical outcome of philosoph- 
ical research. One of the most prominent representatives 
of the former is Noire. He entitles one of his little works 
"Monistic Thought," but shows himself on its pages as a 
very unclear dualist. He speaks of the "dual nature of 
causality" and relates that the mind operates with a differ- 
ent causality than the mere mechanical one. He calls this 
other "sensory causality." 

According to him the world has only two attributes : 
"Motion and sensation are the only true and objective 
qualities of the world. . . . Motion is the truly 
objective . . . though it is admitted that it gives us 
only the phenomenon. . . . Sensation makes up the 
internal nature of things. Every subject, whether man or 
atom, is endowed with the two qualities of all beings, viz., 
motion and sensation." 

Thereupon I have carefully looked for an explanation 
in Noire's works, why he regards the nature of things as 
composed of an external and an internal quality, and why 
sensation should not be regarded as a sort of motion, but 
the only reason I could find was the dualistic nature of his 
"monistic" reasoning. 

As Schopenhauer provided the whole world with a 
"will," so Noire provides it with "sensation." 

Kant and his "Critical Philosophy" held in their time 
that our intellect perceives only the phenomena of nature, 
while the mystic law of causality, according to him, points 
to a hidden being, which cannot be perceived but must be 
believed, which we may venerate but must leave undis- 
turbed by science. Schopenhauer, his brilliant successor, 
who in spite of his brilliancy did not materially advance 
the cause of philosophy, mystified the problem of causality 
by his discovery that the nature of the world is will power. 



280 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

These teachings of Kant and Schopenhauer are dressed 
up anew and mixed with the recent discoveries of science 
by Noire. But he entirely ignores the work of Schelling 
and Hegel, who by their criticisms have made evident the 
lack of logic in the Kantian separation of phenomenon 
(apparition) from noumenon (essence), of cause from 
effect. 

You are familiar with the silly question wnether 
Goethe or Schiller, Shakespere or Byron, is the greater 
poet, and you will not think that I am trying to elevate 
Hegel above Kant or Kant above Hegel. They are just 
two cogs on the spinning wheel of history. If the second 
crushes what the first has cracked, such is the result of 
their succession. 

Natural science is also a valuable co-operator in the 
solution of the world problem, not so much by digging in 
the logical tunnel itself, or making amateur excursions 
into the fields of philosophy or metaphysics, but because it 
elucidates and renders tangible the special object of logic 
in such far-embracing objects as the unity of natural 
forces or of animal species. The scientific presentation of 
this special object, however, requires a brain armed with 
the full equipment of the historical outcome of philosophy. 

Now you must not believe that I am conceited enough 
to place my own little personality on the pedestal as the 
only^true philosopher. I am too well aware of my short- 
comings as a self-educated man. But seeing that I have 
striven earnestly and without prejudice since my young 
days to understand the high object of my studies, I feel in 
my heart a certain confidence in my qualification to deal 
with it. On the other hand, I know my lack of that sort 
of learning which is required in order to be able to present 
the scientifically much-courted nature of the human mind 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 281 

in such a form and with such emphasis as its sublime 
character deserves. And if I, nevertheless, come before 
the public on various occasions with my tentative works, I 
offer as an excuse that hitherto the Messiah has not ap- 
peared who will come after me and whose John the Bap- 
tist I should like to be. 

You, my dear Eugene, will take me soberly and reduce 
my resounding words to their proper measure, when I, in 
the intoxication of enthusiasm, flow over like that now 
and then. You know that I am no hero worshipper. 
Though all research is but the product of individual 
minds, the mind of each man is a part of the universal 
mind which produces science. Now follows the point 
which forms the conclusion of all my letters : The intel- 
lect which produces science is indeed a part of man, but 
still more a part of the world, it is the universal world 
intellect, the reason of the absolute, the absolute reason. 

The study of this intellect at work, not merely in shoe- 
making, in anatomy, or in astronomy, but in all fields, in 
the infinite, of its life in the absolute, is the means by 
which the art of logic is acquired. It is true that the in- 
finite exists only in finite parts, and you cannot conceive 
of the infinite directly, you can perceive it only in its parts. 
And in perceiving them you must always remember that 
every part is an infinite piece of the infinite universe. 

In his "Introduction and Proofs of a Monistic Theory 
of Understanding," Noire, after enumerating the new 
points contained in his work, adds sneeringly that he is 
"not in a position to give any new clews as to the nature of 
the absolute." For this very reason I want to denounce 
his "Monism" as a shallow piece of work, which offers 
only the name instead of the essence. 

The well-known Ernst Hseckel knows a great deal 



282 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

more about this subject. In a lecture given at the twenty- 
fifth convention of natural scientists in Eisenach, he calls 
the monistic view of nature "a grand pantheistic one." 
The essence of all religion, according to him, consists in 
the "conviction of a final and unmistakably common cause 
of all things." And he continues : "In the admission 
that with the present day organization of our brain, we 
are unable to penetrate to the final cause of all things, the 
critical natural philosophy and dogmatic religion agree." 
Whether the professor is one of those natural philos- 
ophers who regard the human mind as too narrow for the 
understanding of the "unmistakably (hence somewhat 
understood) common cause of all things," is not quite 
clear to me, nor probably to the famous scientist himself. 
For he adds : "The more we progress in the understand- 
ing of nature, the more we approach that unattainable 
final cause." And further on : "The purest form of mon- 
istic faith culminates in the conviction of the unity of God 
and nature." 

Now I ask : If nature, God, and absolute truth are 
one and the same thing, have we not learned something 
about the "final cause of all things?" What necessity is 
there in that case for speaking in such an abjectedly hum- 
ble tone of human understanding, or to assign nothing but 
straw and husks to it, in the language of Hegel ? 

You see, then, that Hseckel has a higher estimate of 
absolute nature than Noire who does not care to have any- 
thing to do with the nature of the absolute. But my 
object at this moment is to convince you that neither the 
one nor the other of these two, nor natural science, so- 
called, is directly digging in the tunnel which will give us 
light on the question of the limits of our understanding 
and the final cause of things. Our logic, on the other 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 283 

hand, which treats the intellect as a part of nature, culti- 
vates a natural science that includes the mere empirical 
natural science in the same way in which the day of 
twenty-four hours includes the day of twelve hours and 
the night. 

Natural science proper deals mainly with tangible 
things. Light and sound, the objects of eye and ear, are 
still included in its studies. The objects of smell and taste 
stand on the dividing line. But the socalled sciences of 
the mind, such as grammar and politics, political economy 
and history, morals and law, and most decidedly logic, 
are entirely excluded. 

Such a limitation is well enough, if we remember that 
it is purely formal. However, it must not overlook the 
bridge which leads from limited nature to universal, in- 
finite, nature. 

The monism of natural science has a far too narrow 
view of the universe. When it says that "all is motion," 
it says just as little or as much as Solomon with his "all 
is vain." Everything is crooked and straight, everything 
great and small, everything temporal and eternal, every- 
thing truth and life. But nothing is thus said to show the 
meaning of distinction in this world, to explain how rest 
exists in motion, and sense in nonsense. 

In order to differentiate logically we must know that 
everything is everything, that the universe or absolute is 
its own cause and the final cause of all things, which em- 
braces all distinctions, even that of causality and that be- 
tween matter and mind. 



NINETEENTH LETTER 

"Philosophy should not try to be edifying," said 



284 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

Hegel. This means that religious feeling is far below 
scientific thought. But there is a reverse side to this sen- 
tence, viz., that thoughts which do not rise to the edifying 
interconnection of all things, no matter whether they re- 
main stuck in some specialty on account of frivolousness 
or of narrowmindedness, are far below a wise world phil- 
osophy. 

In a former letter I have already emphasized, and I 
hope to prove it more convincingly, that the conception of 
"God," or of the absolute, is indispensable for a logical 
world philosophy. 

You know that in my dictionary the gods and divinities 
of all religions and denominations are "idols," and justly 
so, since they are all manufactured images. Instead of 
the entire universe, they worship a more or less unessen- 
tial part of it. 

The religions show by their idolatry, the sciences fre- 
quently by their little creditable indifference, that they 
have no conception of the intellect and its art of reason- 
ing. 

The universe is a familiar conception. Everybody 
uses it, and there is apparently little to say about it. But 
in fact it is the conception of all conceptions, the being of 
all beings, the cause of itself which has no other cause 
and no other being beside itself. That the whole world 
is contained in the universe is so obvious that you may 
wonder at my waste of words over such a matter-of-fact 
thing. But when you consider that the people have 
always searched for a world cause outside of the world, 
together with a beginning of the world and a transcen- 
dental truth, then you will see that they have not grasped 
the conception of the world as a whole, as a universe. 
And if that is admitted, then the proof that it is the cause 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 28o 

of all causes, the beginning of all beginnings, and the 
truth of all truths, is not such a superfluous undertaking. 

Now you may say that it is presumptuous to try to 
understand the whole universe at once. This objection is 
justified in a way, according to the interpretation of the 
words. Still I hope that it will be my justification to de- 
clare that it is not a question of understanding the uni- 
verse in detail, but only in general, not each and every- 
thing in its differentiation, but only in a summary way. 
And it is only the edifying conception of the universe as 
a whole which will open for you the door to the under- 
standing of the human mind, of thought, and the art of 
using it. We wish to understand the conception ; not this 
or that conception, but the whole conception, the concep- 
tion of the whole. You will no longer indulge in the 
superstition that the faculty of thought or understanding 
is a thing apart from the world's interconnection. I pre- 
sume that you have now learned enough about the art of 
thought to be sure not to think of anything without its 
worldwide interrelation. For so long as one imagines 
that a piece of wood or a stone is a thing in itself, without 
connection with light and air, with Earth, Moon, and Sun, 
he has a very barbarian conception of the things of this 
world. 

I maintain that the understanding of the human 
faculty of reason and the art of its use are inseparable 
from the world concept. And I want this understood in 
the sense, that it is not a mistake to distinguish between 
the internal mind and the outside world, but that these 
are merely formal distinctions of the essentially indivisible 
and absolute universe. 

The concept of this true God or divine, because uni- 
versal, Truth shows on close analysis that it includes the 



286 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

special truth of the art of thought as well as all other 
sciences, and pre-eminently the science of thought, be- 
cause this science must not limit itself to any special 
thing, but must be world wisdom by its very will and 
nature. 

To understand the universe, then, means to become 
aware that this being of all beings has no beginning, no 
cause, no truth nor reason outside and beside itself, but 
has everything in and by itself. To understand the uni- 
verse means to recognize that one is rushing beyond the 
worldly infinity into the realm of fantastic transcenden- 
talism and abusing the intellect, when illogically applying 
such terms as beginning and end, cause and effect, being 
and not being, to the absolute universe. Such an illogical 
use of the faculty of thought is well illustrated and re- 
buked by the poet who ueestions and answers: 

"And when my life has passed away, 

What will become of me? 
The world has one eternal day, 

'Thereafter' cannot be." 

In order to acquire the universal sense, you will strive 
to understand that the universe includes all relative things, 
while as a whole it embodies the absolute or the edifying 
deity. 

If you would become world-wise, you must learn that 
the things called opposites and contradictions have a dif- 
ferent meaning than is ordinarily applied to them by the 
logic of the idolators. They say that God and the world, 
body and soul, truth and error, life and death, etc., are 
irreconcilable antipodes ; that they exclude one another ; 
that they cannot be brought under the same roof, but 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 287 

must be kept wide apart by the laws of eternal reason. 
But this doctrine of contradiction is merely narrow dog- 
matism, which confuses the minds instead of enlightening 
them. Certainly, death differs from life, the perishable 
from the imperishable, black from white, crooked from 
straight, large from small. Who would be silly enough 
to deny that ? But even the apparently most contradictory 
and opposite things may be classified under the same 
genus, family, or species, as twins in a mother's womb. 
The same thing that does not prevent male and female 
from sitting in the same nest, does not prevent the most 
widely different things, in spite of their separate charac- 
ters, from being one and the same, from being two pieces 
of the same caliber. You are certainly still the same 
Eugene that you were as a little baby, and yet you are at 
the same time another. The experts in physiology even 
claim that they can compute how often a man of sixty has 
changed his flesh, bones, skin, and hair. Although the 
old man is the same individual that he was when first 
born, yet he never remained the same. 

You will see by this illustration that all difference is 
of the same nature, a general, supreme, universal being, 
absolute and divine, and this absolute world being is 
highly edifying, because it comprises all other beings and 
is the Alpha and Omega of all things. 

Is this world-god a mere idea ? No, it is the truth and 
life itself. And it is very interesting to note that the so- 
called "ontological proof of the existence of God" agrees 
very well with the world truth which I proclaim in the 
tabernacle of logic. This proof is originally attributed to 
the learned Anselmo of Canterbury. However that may 
be, it is certain that Descartes and Spinoza support him 
with their famous names. They hold that the "most per- 



288 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

feet being" must necessarily have existence, because other- 
wise it would not be the most perfect. 

"I understood very well," writes Descartes in the 
fourth section of his "Method of Correct Thought," "that 
in accepting the hypothesis of a triangle I would have to 
accept the fact that the sum of its three angles is equal 
to two right angles. But nothing convinced me of the 
presence of such a triangle, while I found that my con- 
ception of the most perfect being was as inseparably 
linked to existence as my conception of a triangle is to the 
identity of the sum of its angles with two right angles. 
Hence it is certainly as undeniable as any geo- 
metrical proof can be that God exists as this most perfect 
being." 

This argument appears to me as clear as daylight and 
ought to convince you, not of the existence of a transcen- 
dental idol, but of the truth of the absolute and most per- 
fect world being. If you were to remark that this per- 
fectness is not so very great, considering its many obvious 
imperfections, I should ask you not to split hairs and to 
recognize with sane senses that these imperfections of the 
world belong as logically to the perfect world as the evil 
desires belong to virtue which becomes virtue only by the 
test of overcoming them. The conception of a perfection 
which has no imperfections to overcome would be a silly 
idea. 

Now in conclusion let me say a few words of apology 
for continually interchanging the universe and the concept 
of the universe. I frequently speak of the idea of a thing 
as if it were the thing itself. But see here ! Do you not 
ask on seeing the portrait of some person unknown to 
you : Who is this ? And do you not interchange the por- 
trait for the person itself, without difficulty and misunder- 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 289 

standing? The idea stands in the same relation to the 
thing, as the portrait to the person it represents. This re- 
mark is directed against that unsound logic which knows 
only the separation of the idea from the thing, of reason 
from its objects, but does not grasp the mere formality 
of such a distinction, does not appreciate the unity of the 
world, the edifying and supreme truth, the truth of the 
supreme being. 

This letter, my dear Eugene, pleads for edification, but 
only for that kind of edification which includes the unedi- 
fying, whereby edification is sobered down. If you would 
give the name of pantheism to this world philosophy, you 
should remember that it is not a sentimental and exalted, 
but a common sense pantheism, a deification which has the 
taste of the godless. 



TWENTIETH LETTER 

Dear Eugene: 

Today I am going to present my case with the pre- 
cision of a schoolmaster. 

The concept of white cabbage embraces all white cab- 
bage heads that ever were and ever will be. 

The concept of cabbage embraces red, white, and many 
other kinds of cabbage. The concept of vegetable 
embraces a still wider range. The organic field is still 
more comprehensive. And finally the world concept em- 
braces everything which we know and don't know, the 
end of which we cannot conceive, and which therefore is 
called infinite. 

When we trace our steps backward over the same rea- 
soning, we find at once that the universal concept is 



290 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

divided into two parts, viz., the universe and the concep- 
tion of it. We thus find the world in the concept and the 
concept in the world, so that both of these parts are inter- 
connected, each is the predicate of the other, and whether 
we turn the thing to the right or to the left, the concept 
is in the world and the world in the concept. 

Now it is true that the concept, or the faculty of under- 
standing, is the object of our study rather than the world 
outside of it. The faculty of understanding, by the way, 
is nothing but a collective noun for all concepts, hence 
simply another name for concept in general. But what I 
eternally repeat is this : We cannot make a concept sepa- 
rated from all the rest of the world the object of our study, 
because that would be an empty abstraction which does 
not take on any meaning until we connect it with the 
world, for instance the special concept of cabbage with 
sense-perceived cabbage and so forth. 

The concepts of white cabbage, cabbage in general, 
vegetables, or plants, etc., are all of them special con- 
cepts and at the same time general concepts. The one and 
the other is relative. Compared to the various species it 
includes, the general concept of cabbage is abstract, while 
compared to the general concept of vegetables it is con- 
crete. And so it is with all concepts. They are abstract 
and concrete at the same time. Only the final concept, the 
world concept, is neither concrete nor abstract, but abso- 
lute. It is the concept of the absolute, which is indispen- 
sable for an understanding of logic. 

We found a while ago that the absolute world concept 
consisted of two parts, viz., the concept and the world. In 
the same way, the chemists teach us that water consists 
of two elements, each of which by itself does not make 
any water, while their compound makes pure water. But 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 291 

we do not need such distant illustrations. My table in its 
present composition is something different from what it 
would be if the same pieces were put together in some 
other way and without a plan. 

Therefore the world concept is a far more sublime con- 
cept then all the parts of which it consists. And in 
order to make this quite clear, I may honor this compound 
of the world and its concept by a special name, say "uni- 
verse," so as to distinguish it from its component parts. 

Now I declare, without fear of having the word turned 
in my mouth by any sophist, that the world embracing the 
thought, or the universe, is the absolute which includes 
everything, while the world and the thought of it, each by 
itself, are but classifications or relative things. 

We wish to understand thought, not empty abstract 
thought, but the universal world-embracing thought, the 
thought in a philosophical sense. This is not mere 
thought, but living truth, the universe, the absolute, the 
supreme being. 

It is with the universe and its parts as it is with a tele- 
scope and its concentric rings. Our intellect is a special 
ring which gives us a picture of the whole concentric 
thing. This photographer, as I have called it in a former 
letter, is not the object of our study for its own sake, nor 
for the sake of its pictures, but rather for the sake of the 
original, of the universe. It is as if somebody were to 
buy a portrait of some historically renowned person. No 
matter how much concerned the buyer would be with the 
picture, in the last analysis he is concerned with that per- 
son itself. So it is with the art of understanding the ab- 
solute, with world wisdom, which we study not for the 
sake of the wisdom, but of the world itself. 

This lengthy discussion might have been cut short by 



292 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

simply speaking of the world instead of going to so much 
trouble on account of the world concept. But I should 
then miss my point, which is that the human intellect is a 
part of the world, and that the ideological distinction 
which separates this intellect from the rest of the world, 
requires for the whole an embracing term. 

The absolute concept is the concept of the absolute, 
of the supreme being. To it applies all the true, good, 
and beautiful ever attributed to God, and it is also that 
being which lends logic, consistency, and form to all 
thought. 

Plato is a philosopher who has thrown a wonderful 
light on the faculty of understanding, though he has. not 
fully explained it. In his dialogue entitled "Gorgias," he 
makes Socrates say the following: ''Does it seem to you 
that men want that with which they occupy themselves 
at any time, or that for the sake of which they undertake 
whatever they may be engaged in? Do those, for in- 
stance, who take some medicine prescribed by the physi- 
cians seem to want that which they do . or to 
want that for the sake of which they take medicine, viz., 
health? ... In the same way those who go on 
board of ships and trade«do not want that which they are 
doing ; for who would care to go to sea and face danger 
or conquer obstacles? That for which they go to sea is 
that which they want, viz., to become rich ; they are going 
to sea for the sake of acquiring wealth." 

Plato thus says that the immediate purposes of men 
are not their real purposes, but means to an end, means 
to welfare or for "good." He therefore continues : "It 
is in pursuit of good, then, that we go when we go, be- 
cause we are after something better, and we stand still for 
the sake of the same ffood." 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 293 

Now let us go a step farther than Socrates and Plato. 
Just as men's actions are truly done, not for the sake of 
some immediate purpose, but of the ulterior, of welfare, 
and just as their socalled ethical actions are justified only 
by the general wellbeing, so all things of the world are not 
substantiated by their immediate environment, but by the 
infinite universe. It is not the seed planted in the soil 
which is the cause of the growing plant, as the farmer 
thinks, but the Earth, the Sun, the winds, and the weather, 
in short, the whole of nature, and that includes the seed 
germ. 

If we apply this reasoning to our special object, the 
faculty of understanding, we find that it is not a narrowly 
human, nor a transcendental, but a universal cosmic 
faculty. According to Homer, the immortal gods call 
things by other names than mortal men. But once you 
have grasped the concept of the absolute, you understand 
the language of the gods, you understand that the intellect 
by itself is but a minute particle, while in the interrelation 
with the universe it is an absolute and integral part of the 
universal absolute. 

All things have a dual nature, all of them are limited 
parts of the unlimited, the inexhaustible, the unknowable. 
Just as all things are small and great, temporal and eter- 
nal, so all of them including the human mind are know^ 
able and unknowable at the same time. We must not 
idolize the faculty of thought nor forget its divine nature. 
Man should be humble, but without bowing in doglike 
submission to a transcendental spirit, and he should be 
sustained by the sublime consciousness that his spirit is 
the true one, the spirit of universal truth. 

Everything can be seen by eyes, including those of a 
hawk. Just as the eye is the instrument of vision, so the 



294 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

intellect is the instrument of thought. And just as specta- 
cles and glasses are means of assisting the eye in seeing, 
so senses, experience, and experiments are means of 
assisting the intellect in understanding. With this equip- 
ment the intellect can assimilate everything in its concep- 
tions. It understands "all," but "all" only in a relative 
sense. We understand all, just as we buy everything for 
money. We can buy only what is for sale. Reason and 
sunshine cannot be valued in money. We can see every- 
thing with eyes, and yet not everything. Sounds and 
smells cannot be seen. Just as everything is great and 
small, so everything is knowable and unknowable, accord- 
ing to the meaning given to "everything" in the language 
of men or gods. That word has the dual meaning of 
applying to any particle and to the whole universe. So is 
the human mind universal, but only a universal specialty. 

Look at that magnificently colored carnation. You 
see the whole flower, and yet you do not see all of it. You 
do not see its scent nor its weight. In the human language 
"whole" means a relative whole, which is at the same time 
a part. Every particle of the universe is such a dual thing. 
But in the language of the gods, which is spoken by phil- 
osophy, only the absolute universe is whole. 

When the subject under discussion is not the intel- 
lect but some other part of the world, for instance the 
eyes, the universal concept of the absolute is not so impor- 
tant, because the faculty of seeing, like the faculty of 
wealth, is in little danger of being metaphysically abused. 

One knows that eyes which can see around a corner, 
or through a block of iron, or which can perceive the scent 
of a carnation, are as meaningless as a white sorrel. Even 
though our eyes cannot see the invisible, that does not 



LETTERS ON LORIC 295 

prevent them from being a universal instrument which 
can see everything, that is everything visible. 

If you understand this, you will also see through the 
miserable wisdom of. the professors which wallows on its 
belly in the dust and cries with the faithful : O Lord, O 
Lord ! similarly to Du Bois-Reymond, who cries out : 
Ignorabimus! It is true that the human mind is an igno- 
ramus in the sense that it is ever learning, because there 
is inexhaustible material in nature. There is also some- 
thing unknowable in every particle of nature, just as there 
is something invisible in every carnation. But the un- 
knowable in the sense used by those ignorant people who 
cannot understand the human mind because they have 
a transcendental monster in their mind, such a monstrous 
unknowable exists only in the imagination of the idolators 
to whom the true spirit reveals itself as little as the spirit 
of truth. 

Just as surely as we know that there cannot be in 
heaven any knife without a blade and a handle, nor any 
black horses that are white, just so surely do we know 
that the faculty of understanding can never and nowhere 
be the absolute, but must always be a special faculty. The 
concept of understanding, like the concept of a knife, is 
limited to a definite instrument. There may be all kinds 
of knives and intellects, but nothing exists that has 
escaped from its own skin or from the limitation of its 
own particular concept. 

By this standard you may measure the silly thought of 
those who speak transcendentally of an unlimited faculty 
of understanding. They haven't any right idea of the 
mind nor of the universe, of the conceivable nor of the 
inconceivable, otherwise they would not speak in such a 
nonsensical sense of the "Limits of Understanding." In 



296 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

short, you see that the relative limitation or absoluteness 
of reason can only be understood by means of the con- 
cept of the absolute. 



TWENTY-FIRST LETTER 



The proletarian logic of the working class searches 
after the supreme being. The working class knows that 
it must serve but it wants to know whom to serve. Shall 
it be an idol or a king ? Where, who, what, is the supreme 
being to which everything else is subordinate, which 
brings system, consistency, logic, into our thought and 
actions? The next question is then: By what road do 
we arrive at its understanding ? Any transcendental reve- 
lation being of no use to us, there are only two ways 
open : Reason and experience. 

Now it is a mistake of common logic to regard these 
two roads as separate, while, in fact, they are one and the 
same common road, which by the help of empirical reason 
or reasonable experience leads us to the point where we 
recognize that the supreme being to which everything is 
subordinate, is nothing special, not a part or a particle, but 
the universe itself with all its parts. 

We take medicine for the sake of health, we make 
efforts for the sake of wealth. But neither health nor 
wealth are an end in themselves. What good is health to 
us, when we have nothing to bite ? What good are all the 
treasures of Croesus, if health is lacking? Therefore 
health and wealth must be combined. Nor is that enough. 
There is a spirit in us that drives us farther ahead. There 
are still other treasures and requirements, for instance 
contentment is surely one of them. But the motive power 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 297 

of the world spirit is so infinite, that it is not satisfied 
until it has everything. Everything, then, in other words 
the whole world, that is the true end. 

Socrates and his school, to whom I alluded in the pre- 
ceding letter, wandered the way of separate reason for the 
purpose of finding the supreme being, the true, the good, 
the beautiful. The platonic dialogues paint a very mag- 
nificent picture of the truth that neither health nor wealth, 
neither bravery nor devotion, are "the greatest good," but 
that it is mainly a question of the understanding and use 
to which mankind put these things. Accordingly they 
are good or bad, they are but relative "goods.' Love and 
faith, honesty and veracity, are good enough, but not the 
good ; they only partake of the good. What is sought is 
that which is under all circumstances absolutely good, 
true, and beautiful. 

When Socrates asked his disciples to define the good 
or reasonable, they enumerated as a rule a series of good 
and reasonable specialties, while the master was contin- 
ually compelled to instruct them, that his research was not 
aimed at those objects. They name important virtues, and 
he wants to know what absolute virtue is. They name 
good things, and he is looking for the good, for pure 
goodness, while the good things have the bad quality of 
being good only under certain circumstances. 

The Socratic school then finds out that only the under- 
standing or the intellect can find the circumstances under 
which we may arrive at the absolute. Understanding, the 
human mind, philosophy, is to them the divine. Thus they 
arrive at their famous "Know thyself," which in their 
language means : Hold introspection and rack your brain. 
But they did not succeed in thus using the intellect as an 
oracle. Nor did the Christian philosophers of later times 



298 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

fare any better with that method, when they changed the 
title of the object of their studies and substituted God, 
Liberty, and Immortality, for the good, the true, and the 
beautiful. 

In order to get out of the confusion resulting from 
the many names given to the object of logic in the course 
of history, it must be remembered that pagan as well as 
Christian research founded their quest for the absolute on 
the innate need of understanding the supreme being 
which was to be the pivot of all thought and action. 
Polytheism had to have a supreme god, no matter whether 
his name was Zeus or Jupiter. In consequence of this 
longing for unity it was very natural that the place of the 
many immortals was finally taken by one eternal father of 
all. The philosophers are distinguished from the the- 
ologians only in so far as the former seek for the fulcrum 
of the world more on real than on imaginary ground. 

After more than two thousand years of mediation by 
intermediary links, ancient philosophy has at last been 
transformed into modern democratic-proletarian logic 
which recognizes that the intellect is an instrument which 
leads to the supreme being on condition that it does not 
rack the brain but goes outside of itself and consciously 
connects itself with the world outside. This connection 
constitutes the supreme being, the imperishable, eternal, 
truth, goodness, beauty, and reason. All other things only 
"partake of it," to use Platonic language. 

Although the Socratic school were handicapped by 
many fantastical attributes, still they were on the road 
towards true logic, as neither health nor wealth, nor any 
other treasure or virtue satisfied them. They did not care 
for true phenomena, but for truth itself. But truth is the 
universe, and man must understand that this is the only 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 299 

truth, in order to be able to use his intellect logically, to 
be reasonable in the highest and classical sense of this 
word. 

All the world speaks of logic and logical thought. But 
when you, my son, as a thinking man feel the need of get- 
ting out of phraseology and knowing exactly what words 
should mean, you will hardly find one book that will give 
you sufficient light on the subject of logic. The best book 
would be the Bible, perhaps. I mean that, when you in- 
quire after beginning and end, purpose and destination, 
in short, after that which would give you and all things 
a definite support, when you search for the vortex around 
which everything revolves, then the Bible does not tell 
you about the beginning of this or that part of history, 
but speaks of the absolute beginning and end of all his- 
tory, of the general purpose and general destination of all 
existence. That is what I call logic. 

The free thinkers were not satisfied with religious 
mythology, they wanted to bring consistency and logic 
into their brains by their own studies. Plato and Aristotle 
have done good work along this line. So have the subse- 
quent philosophers, Cartesius, Spinoza, Kant. The main 
impediment for all of them was the obstinate prejudice 
that man could have reason in his own brain. Of course, 
that is where he has it, but it is not reasonable reason. 
The intellect shut up in the skull has not wisdom in its 
keeping, as the ancients thought. Wisdom cannot be 
acquired by racking your brain. Hegel is right : Reason 
is in the brain, it is in all things, "everything is reason- 
able." I merely repeat, then, that the universe is the true 
reason. 

You will not misunderstand the term "racking your 
brain." I am not an opponent of introspective thought, 



300 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

but only desire to call your attention to the fact that it 
has led to the wrong habit of separating thought from 
sight, hearing, feeling, of divesting the mind of the body. 
Just as the Christian looked for salvation outside of the 
flesh, so the philosophers looked for reason or understand- 
ing outside of the connection with the rest of the world, 
outside of experience. It was especially the research 
after the nature of the intellect which imagined it had to 
creep inside of itself. 

When studying the stars, we look at the heavens ; 
when endeavoring to enrich our knowledge of plants, we 
gather flowers. But if we attempt to understand the 
mind, we must not rack our brain, nor dissect it with an 
anatomical knife. We shall indeed find the brain, but not 
the mind, not reason. 

And even the brain is not so easily cut out, as many an 
overzealous materialist may think. The student of anat- 
omy who pries into the nature of the brain substance 
knows very well that this substance is not contained in the 
head of this or that fellow, but must be sought in many 
heads before the average brain is found, which differs 
materially from that of Peter or Paul. This will show 
that your brain is not only your own, but also "partakes" 
of the universal brain, and you will easily conclude from 
this how much less your reason is yours alone. Hegel 
is right : Not only men, but everything is reasonable. 

True, the most rotten conditions may be defended by 
such maxims. Hence the great logician Hegel has the 
bad name of having been, not a philosopher of the people, 
but a royal state philosopher of Prussia. I will neither 
blacken nor whitewash him, nor will I overlook that he 
left the great cause in a state of mystical obscurity. But 
I recognize that even the worst prejudices, the most per- 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 301 

verted morals, laws and institutions, have their reasonable 
justification in the times and conditions of their origin. 
Such an understanding is immediately followed by the 
further insight, that the most reasonable things, crushed 
by the wheel of time, will become rotten and unreasonable. 
In short, the "good" is not any special institutions, but is 
found in the interrelations of the universe. Only the 
absolute is absolutely good. And for this reason not only 
some conservative editors of capitalist papers, but also the 
revolutionary authors of the "Communist Manifesto," are 
genuine Hegelians. 



TWENTY-SECOND LETTER 

Dear Eugene: 

Socrates teaches: When we walk, it is not walking, 
when we stand still, it is not standing which is our pur- 
pose. We always have something ulterior in view, until 
finally the general welfare is the true end of our actions, 
in other words, the "good." And on closer analysis you 
will find that your individual welfare, the socalled egoistic 
good, is not enough in itself. 

You are not only related to your father, mother, broth- 
ers, sisters, relatives and friends, but also to your com- 
munity, state, and finally to the entire population of the 
globe. Your welfare is dependent on their welfare, on 
the welfare of the whole. 

I know very well that the horizon of the everyday capi- 
talist minds does not reach farther than they can see from 
the steeple of their church. They think according to the 
bad maxim : The shirt is closer to the skin than the coat. 
If I had to choose between the shirt and the coat, I should 



302 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

prefer to wear the coat without a shirt rather than to run 
around in shirt sleeves as the object of universal ridicule. 
The old man ■ who plants a tree the fruits of which he will 
perhaps never see is not such a capitalist mind, otherwise 
he would sow seeds that would ripen during this year's 
summer. 

At this juncture we must remember that the disciples 
of Socrates who looked for the absolute under the name 
of the "good," were in so far narrow as they conceived of it 
only from the moral, specifically human, standpoint, in- 
stead of at the same time considering its cosmic side. Just 
as health and wealth belong together, and even these are 
not sufficient for human welfare which further requires 
all social and political virtues, so the good is not com- 
prised in the interrelations of all mankind, but passes 
beyond them and connects itself with the entire universe. 
Without the universe man is nothing. He has no eyes 
without light, no ears without sound, no morals without 
physics. Alan is not so much the measure of all things ; 
his more or less intimate connection with all things is 
rather the measure of all humanity. Not narrow moral- 
ity, but the universe, the supreme being, is the good in the 
very highest meaning of the word, is absolute good, right, 
truth, beauty, and reason. 

In my preceding letter I spoke of universal reason and 
said that not alone men, but also mountains, valleys, for- 
ests and fields, and even fools and knaves were reasonable. 
Now you are familiar with that student's song: "What's 
Coming from the Heights ?" and you know that it makes 
everything leathern. It speaks of a leathern hill, a leathern 
coach-driver, a leathern letter, even father, mother, and 
sister are of leather. And I mention this simply for the 
purpose of showing that I understand that we cannot call 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 303 

leather reasonable and reasonable leathern without brew- 
ing a mixture of language which is lacking the mark by 
which all reasonable language is distinguished from chat- 
tering, howling, and roaring. Language is only reason- 
able when it classifies the world and distinguishes things 
by different names. 

This is easily understood. But it is more difficult to 
see that those who use their intellect without logical train- 
ing exaggerate distinctions to such an extent that they 
ignore the connection between them. All things are not 
only distinct, but also connected. But logic so far must be 
blamed for not rising to the recognition of the interrela- 
tion of all things. The science of understanding fre- 
quently treats reason and experience as if they were two 
different things without a common nature. Therefore, I 
make it a point to insist that there is no experience without 
reason and no reason without experience. 

The linguists who dispute about the question whether 
reason has developed after language or language after 
reason agree that both belong together. One cannot 
speak without the use of reason, or talk without sense, be- 
cause chattering, or babbling, or whatever one may wish 
to call it, are everything else but language. On the other 
hand, there can be no reason without naming the things 
of this world, so as to distinguish between leather and 
lady, between reason and experience. 

Of course, the idea of a leathern lady is only a youthful 
prank. Still it is calculated to illustrate the dialectic 
transfusion of all names and things, of all subjects and 
predicates. It shows indirectly that according to common 
sense thought, reason has its home only in the brain of 
man, and that this reason is nevertheless unsound when it 
does not know and remember that the individual human 



304 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

brain is connected with all brains, and reasons with the 
whole world, so that only all existence and the entire uni- 
verse is reasonable in the highest meaning of the word. 

In order to be able to use your reason in all research 
and on all objects in a reasonable manner, you must know 
that the whole world has one nature, even leather and your 
sister. Apparently there is a wide gulf between these two, 
and yet in both of them the same forces are active, just as 
a black horse has the same horse nature as a white horse, 
so that from this point of view your sister is indeed leath- 
ern and leather sisterly. Such statements sound paradoxi- 
cal enough, yet I insist on making them in this extreme 
manner in order to fully reveal the absolute oneness of all 
existence, since it is the indispensable basis of a reason- 
able understanding of logic. 

Take one of the questions of the day now agitating the 
public mind, for a further illustration. Two tendencies 
are now observed in the most radical political movement 
of the nations. One of them is called propaganda of the 
deed. It works in Russia and Ireland with dynamite, 
powder, and lead. The other recommends the propa- 
ganda of the word, of the vote, and of lawful agitation. 
And the difference between these two is not discussed rea- 
sonably with a view to ascertaining for whom, when, 
where, and why, this or that propaganda is fitting, but. 
every one tries to present his relative truth with the fanac- 
ical sectarianism of those who claim absolute truth. But 
if you have grasped the method of getting at truth, the 
true method of using your reasoning faculty, you will 
take sides for one thing today and for another thing to- 
morrow, because you will understand that all roads are 
leading toward Rome. And if some of the comrades out- 
vote you occasionally, you will still value these antagon- 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 305 

ists as friends, and if yoit combat them, even in a war to 
the knife, this will still be a relative war, a use of the knife 
with reason. 

Our proletarian logic is tolerant, not fanatical. This 
logic does not want to be reasonable without passion, nor 
passionate without reason. It does not abolish the differ- 
ence between friend and foe, between truth and falsehood, 
between reason and nonsense, but calms the fanaticism 
which exaggerates those distinctions. ')Its fundamental 
maxim is : There is only one absolute, the universe. 

Remember well that the conception of a universe 
which has anything outside or beside itself is still more 
senseless, if possible, than the idea of wooden iron. You 
thus see that all differences have one common nature 
which does not permit a transcendentally wide difference 
between things or opinions. Because the universe is the 
^ipreme being, therefore all differences, even those of 
Opinion, are unessential. 

For the purpose of studying logic, I entreat you to 
pay special attention to the question of essential differ- 
ences and to test it by your own experience which will 
come to you from day to day. 

By means of our logic we learn the language of the 
gods. In the dictionary of this language, there is only 
one essential being, the universal or supreme being. On 
the other hand, the language of the mortals calls every 
particle a "being," but such being can be relative beings 
only. 

Every ear of a cornfield, every hair of an ox skin, and 
even every one of their particles, is such a being. But 
these relative beings are at the same time unessential at- 
tributes. Thus all differences between the particles of the 
world are simultaneously essential and unessential; in 



306 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

other words, they have a relative existence, they merely 
partake of the supreme being, compared to whom they are 
absolutely unessential. Whether you are a good or a bad 
man, whether your country is happy or unhappy, free or 
oppressed, is very essential to you or me, but compared 
with the great absolute whole it is very unessential. In 
the universal history the fate of any single nation has no 
more significance than one hair on my head, although 
none of my hairs is there by mere chance and all of them 
have been counted. Hence everything is in its particular 
and isolated self an unessential thing, but in the general 
interrelation everything is a necessary, reasonable, essen- 
tial and divine particle. 

And now we come to the moral of it all. The human 
reason, the special object of logical research, partakes of 
the nature of the universe. It is nothing in itself. As an 
isolated being, it is wholly void and incapable of produc- 
ing any understanding or knowledge. Only in connec- 
tion, not merely with the material brain, but with the 
entire universe, is the intellect capable of existing and act- 
ing. It is not the mere brain which thinks, but the whole 
man is required for that purpose ; and not man alone, but 
the total interrelation with the universe is necessary for 
the purpose of thinking. Reason itself reveals no truths. 
The truths which are revealed to us by means of reason, 
are revelations of the general nature of the absolute 
universe. 

If you think of reason in this way, then, my son, you 
are thinking reasonably, are world-wise, logical, and true. 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 307 

TWENTY-THIRD LETTER 

(A) 

Although we know that there is no actual beginning, 
because we are living in the universe without beginning 
and end, still we mortals must always begin at a certain 
point. So I have begun one of my retrospects over the 
history of my subject with Plato, and at another time I 
have ended with Hegel, although before and after them 
there has been much philosophical thought. These two 
names are luminant points which throw their light over 
everything which is situated between them. 

The errors of our predecessors are just as useful for 
the purpose of illustration as their positive achievements. 
More even: the errors form the steps of a ladder which 
leads toward a universal world philosophy. We clamber 
up and down on it, pefhaps a little irregularly, but now- 
adays the crooked roads of an English park are preferred 
to the straight French avenues. 

It was an achievement on the part of the Socratic and 
Platonic schools to seek the good not in good specialties, 
but in general good as a "pure" or absolute thing, to 
search for virtue in general instead of virtues. But it was 
a mistake which prevented their success, to exaggerate 
the distinction between the special and the general. Ac- 
cording to Plato, the black and white horses canter over 
terrestrial pavements, but the horse in general, which is 
neither brown, black, nor white, neither as slender as a 
race horse nor as clumsy as a draft horse, cantered along 
in the Platonic "idea," in the ideal mists. Platonic logic 
lacked what is taught by our present, or if you pre- 
fer, future proletarian logic, viz., the general understand- 
ing of the interrelation of all things, the truth that in 



308 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

spite of their individual differences all things belong 
together as individuals of the same genus. The logical 
relation between individual and genus stuck upside down 
in the brain of the noble Plato. 

He lived in a time which is similar to our own time in 
that the world of the gods of the ancients was in the same 
state of dissolution in which the Christian religions are 
today. Plato was as little satisfied with Grecian mythol- 
ogy as a basis for a reasonable explanation of the world, 
as we are with Christian mythology. He wanted to 
ascend to the universal truth, not by way of little tradi- 
tional stories, but by scientific philosophy. His intention 
was good, but his weak flesh wrestled with a task which 
required thousands of years for its solution. 

A while ago I said that it was that topsy-turvy view 
of religion as to the relation between the special and the 
general which thwarted Plato. Let me illustrate a little 
more in detail in what this religious topsy-turvydom con- 
sisted. 

Here we have wind., the waters of the seas, the rays of 
the sun, chemical and physical forces, forces of nature. 
These are specimens of the universal force of nature. 
These specimens were regarded with sober enough eyes 
by the Greeks, but the general nature sat high upon 
Olympus in the form of Zeus. In the same way, the 
Greeks were familiar with beautiful things, but beauty 
was an unapproachable goddess, Aphrodite. True, the 
philosopher no longer believed in the gods, but he was 
nevertheless still under the influence of transcendental 
concepts and thus he mystified the general under the name 
of the "idea.' The Platonic ideas, like the gods of the 
heathen, are mystifications of the general. Plato further- 
more shows himself as a descendant of polytheism ia 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 309 

this: Although he clearly distinguished between virtue 
and virtuous things, between beauty and beautiful things, 
between truth and true things, yet he did not rise to the 
understanding that all generalities are amalgamated and 
unified in the absolute generality, that, in so far, the good, 
the true, and the beautiful are identical. The research 
for the absolute did not become monistic until Christian 
monotheism lent a hand. You will see from this that 
religion and philosophy form a common chapter which 
has the genus of all genera for its object. Faith is distin- 
guished from science in that the latter no longer bows to 
the dictates of imagination and of its organs, the priests, 
but seeks to fathom the object of its studies by the exact 
use of the intellect. A partial amalgamation of the two 
is, therefore, quite natural. 

"When a woman is strong, isn't she strong after the 
same conception and the same strength? By the term 
same," says the Platonic Socrates, "I mean that it makes 
no difference whether the strength is in the man or in the 
woman." 

This quotation, taken from Plato's "Menon," shows 
that Platonic research deals with the general, in this case 
the general concept of strength which is the same in man 
or woman, ox or mule, Tom and Jerry. It is the genus 
by means of which black and white horses are known as 
horses, dogs and monkeys as animals, animals and plants 
as organisms, and finally the variations of the whole world 
as the universe, as the same. Plato has grasped this same- 
ness in a limited way, for instance in regard to strength, 
reason, virtue, etc. But that in an infinite sense everything 
is the same, that things as well as ideas, bodies, and souls, 
are the same, remained for radical proletarian logic to 
discover. 



310 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

Hand in hand with the narrow Platonic conception 
of the general went a narrow theory of understanding or 
science, a wrong conception of the intellect and its func- 
tions. The Socratic Plato and the Platonic Socrates both 
call understanding by the name of "remembering." By 
praising understanding, they teach us that we must not 
believe the priests, but study by the help of our senses. 
But, nevertheless, they still teach a wrong method, a nar- 
row art of thought. 

In "Menon," the object of study is virtue. Socrates 
does not exactly pose as a schoolmaster. He knows that 
he is called the wisest of men, but explains that this is 
so, because others have a conceited opinion of their wis- 
dom, while his wisdom consists in humbly knowing that 
he knows nothing. He does not so much try to teach 
what virtue is, as to stimulate his disciples to search for it. 
But his idea of research is distorted. 

Among the immortal things which he transcenden- 
tally separates from mortal things, he also classifies the 
soul, "the immortal soul" which dies and lives again, and 
has always lived, knows everything, but must "remember." 
Thus his research becomes a cudgeling of the brain, an 
introspective speculation. He is not looking for under- 
standing by way of natural science, through the interre- 
lations of the world, but speculatively through the inside 
of the human skull. 

In order to make his theory of memory plain, Socrates 
in "Menon" calls an ignorant slave and instructs him in 
the fundamentals of geometry. He quickly succeeds in 
getting from the ignorant fellow, who at first gives wrong 
answers, the correct statements by recalling the connec- 
tions of thought by clever questioning. He thus demon- 
strates to his satisfaction that man has wisdom a priori 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 311 

in his head. But the Socratic-Platonic art of logic has 
overlooked that such wisdom requires concepts which are 
fixed in memory by internal and external interrelations. 
The socalled immortal soul with its innate wisdom has 
troubled the world a good while thereafter. 

You must not think that I have a poor opinion of 
Plato, because I criticize him in this way. On the con- 
trary, I am highly delighted with his divine and immortal 
writings. "Honor to Socrates, honor to Plato, but still 
more honor to truth." I also assure you that I am a great 
admirer of natural science, but nevertheless I should like 
to show you that it indulges in narrow reasoning. 

Robert Mayer, the talented discoverer of the equiv- 
alent of heat, has proven that the force of gravitation, of 
electricity, of steam, of heat, etc., represents different 
modes of expression of the same force, of the force of 
nature in general. But no, not quite so ! He has ascer- 
tained the numerical relation by which the transformations 
of one force into another is accomplished. Thus a logical 
understanding sees that the various forces and force in 
general are distinguished in detail but identical in gen- 
eral. Darwin in his "Origin of Species" has accomplished 
a similar demonstration. But neither Mayer nor Darwin 
have given that general expression to world unity which is 
required by the art of logic. In order to become an adept 
at this art, you must rise to the understanding that all 
forces are various modes of expression of the one force, 
all animals and species transformations of animaldom', 
that on the moon a part is smaller than the whole, the 
same as on earth, that there as well as here fire burns, 
and that as surely as you have no doubt of your being, 
just as surely is there only one being, the infinite, divine 



312 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

universe which has no other gods beside it, but contains 
all forces, materials, and transformations. 

This is an innate science which is the cause of all other 
science, an innate science which, indeed, must first be 
awakened in you by "memory." 

Hence our proletarian logic instructs you not to rack 
your brain by mere introspection, as the ancient philoso- 
phers used to do, not to call the senses impostors nor to 
search for truth without eyes, nose, and ears, nor on the 
other hand to start out with the idea of certain natural 
scientists who try to see, hear, and smell understanding 
without the help of the intellect. 

The mistake committed in making a wrong use of the 
intellect is a "sin against the holy ghost." The Socratic- 
Platonic doctrine of memory is one extreme side of this 
sin ; the other extreme side is represented by that modern 
science which tries to find truth by mere external means 
and rejects everything as untrue which is not ponderable 
or tangible. 

As this letter is more intimately connected with the 
following one than is ordinarily the case, I take the liberty 
to unite them under the same number and mark them with 
the letters A and B. 



m 

We are still the guests of Plato today, my son, and I 
should like to show you that this philosopher, in whose 
time natural science had barely developed its first downy 
feathers, already suspected its stubborn narrowness, al- 
though in a certain sense the Platonic logic was no less 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 313 

narrow than that of the so-called exact sciences still is 
to-day, at least in part. Still Platonic logic had at least the 
advantage of its outlook toward the Supreme Being, the 
absolute, while modern naturalism is still stuck in the 
narrow land of specialties. Therefore, I hope that you 
will find it interesting to note with me the way in which 
universal truth is peeping forth beneath the wings of Pla- 
tonic speculation. 

"Listen, then, to what I am going to say," remarks 
Socrates in "Phaedo," paragraph 45. "In my youth, O 
Cebes, I had a great interest in natural science, for it 
seemed to me a magnificent thing to know the cause of 
everything, to learn how everything begins, exists, and 
passes. A hundred times I turned to one thing and then 
to another, reflecting about these matters by myself. Do 
animals arise when the hot and the cold begin to disinte- 
grate, as some claim ? Is it the blood, which enables us to 
think, or the air or the fire ? Or is it none of these, but 
rather the brain which produces all perceptions, such as 
seeing, hearing, smelling, and does memory and thought 
then arise by these, and from thought and memory, when 
they become adjusted, understanding? And again, when 
I considered that all this passes away, and the changes 
in heaven and on earth, I finally felt myself poorly quali- 
fied for this whole investigation. Let this be sufficient 
proof to you : In the things which formerly were familiar 
and known to me, I became so doubtful by this investiga- 
tion, that I forgot even that which I thought I knew of 
many other things, as for instance the question as to how 
man grows. I thought that everybody knew that this was 
caused by eating and drinking. For when through the 
food flesh comes to flesh and bone to bone, and in the same 
way that which is akin to all the rest of the things which 



31-1 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

constitute man, it seemed natural that a> small mass would 
become larger, and thus a small man grow tall. Does 
not this appear reasonable to you? . . . Consider 
furthermore this. It seemed enough to me that a man 
appeared large when standing by the side of something 
small, that he looked taller by one head, and in the same 
way one horse by the side of another ; or what is still 
plainer, ten seemed to me more than eight, because it is 
more by two, and a thing of two feet longer than that 
which measures only one foot, because it exceeds it by 
one." 

Thereupon Cebes asks: "Well, and what do you 
think of this now ?" 

"I think, by Zeus," says Socrates, "that I am far re- 
moved from knowing the cause of any of these things. I 
do not even admit that by adding one to one I obtain two, 
by such an addition. For I wonder how it is that each 
was supposed to be one when by itself, while now, that 
they have been added to one another, they have become 
two. Neither can I convince myself that if one thing 
divides a thing in two, that this division is the cause of 
it becoming two. For this would be the opposite way of 
making two. But when I heard somebody reading some- 
thing from a book, written by Anaxagoras as he said, to 
the effect that it is reason which had arranged every- 
thing and was the cause of everything, I rejoiced at this 
cause. . . . Now if one were to search for the cause 
of all things, of their origin, existence and passing, he 
should only find out what is the best way to maintain their 
existence. . . . Hence it is not meet that man should 
care for anything else in regard to himself as well as to all 
other things, but for that which is best and most ex- 
cellent, and then he would also know the worst about 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 315 

things, for the understanding of both is the same. Con- 
sidering this, I was glad to have found a teacher who 
knows about the cause of all things, who suited me, I 
mean Anaxagoras, and who would now tell me, first 
whether the earth is round or flat, and after telling me 
that, would also explain to me the necessity for it and 
the cause, by pointing to the fact that it was better that 
it should be so. And when he claimed that the earth was 
the center of things, I hoped he would explain why it was 
better that it should be the center, and when he had 
explained that, I was resolved that I would not ask for 
any other cause. In the same way I was going to in- 
quire after the cause of the sun, the moon, and the other 
stars, etc. . . . For I did not believe that after claim- 
ing all this to have been arranged by reason, he would 
be dragging in any other cause than that of being best to 
have it just so. And this wonderful hope I had to abandon, 
my friends, when I continued to read and saw that the 
man accomplished nothing by reason and adduces no 
other reasons relating to the arrangement of things, but 
quotes air, and water, and ether, and many other aston- 
ishing things. 

"And it seemed that it was as if some one said Socrates 
accomplishes all things by reason, and then, when he 
began to enumerate the cause of everything I do, were 
to say first that I am sitting here because my body con- 
sists of bones and sinews, and that the bones are hard 
and are differentiated by joints, and the sinews so con- 
structed that they can be extended and shortened, etc. 
And further, if he tried to name the causes of our dis- 
cussion, he would refer to other similar things, such as 
sound, and air and hearing, and a thousand and one other 
things, quite neglecting the true cause, viz., that it suited 



316 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

the Athenians better to condemn me, and that it suited 
me for this reason to stay here and seemed more just 
to me to bear patiently the punishment which they have 
ordered. For I believe that my bones and sinews would 
have gone long ago to the dogs or been carried to the 
Boeotians, had I not considered it more just and beauti- 
ful to atone to the state than to flee. 

"It is very illogical, then, to name such causes. But if 
any one were to say that I should not be able to do what 
I please without these things (sinews and bones, and what- 
ever else I may have) , he would be right. But it would 
be a very thoughtless contention to say that these things 
are the cause of my actions, instead of my free choice to 
do the best. That would show an inability to distinguish 
the fact that in all things the cause is one thing, and an- 
other thing that without which the cause could not be 
cause. And it seems to me that it is precisely this which 
some call by a wrong name in considering it as the cause. 
For this reason some put a whirlwind from heaven round 
the earth and others rest it on air as they would a wide 
trough on a footstool.' 

So far Socrates, whose words I ask you to read re- 
peatedly and carefully, though they may look a little old- 
fashioned. This quotation is somewhat lengthy, but I 
thought best not to cut it too short and to present it in 
its main outlines. 

This quotation says on the whole the same thing 
which I have said in my preceeding letters. According 
to Socrates, all our thoughts and actions have a wider 
and more general purpose, which he- calls the "good/' 
so that we even do evil for the sake of good. A crime 
always aims at some particular good. Evil is misun- 
derstood good. Applied to natural science, this means 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 317 

that it misunderstands the interrelation of all its fine dis- 
coveries. And this charge is true even to-day. Although 
the natural interrelations are more and more recognized 
from day to day, still the understanding of the absolute 
inter-connection continues to be overlooked, especially 
that of the intellect with material things, or of the ideal 
with the real. Natural science teaches after the manner 
of the gospel of John : Abraham begot Isaac, Isaac begot 
Jacob. But it forgets to teach that all these genitors 
were not genitors in the last analysis, but begotten by old 
Jehovah himself. The uncultivated condition of Grecian 
natural sciences may have been ground enough for So- 
crates to think little of it. We, on the other hand, have 
to-day good reasons for thinking highly of natural 
science, and for this very reason I take pains to illus- 
trate by its prominent example in what respect the ne- 
glect of the universal world thought results in a narrow 
conception of the world. 

We may well rejoice more lastingly than Socrates 
when natural science teaches us how it happens that 
everything has its origin, life, and end, because the knowl- 
edge of natural science has been far more enriched by 
modern experiences than it was at the time of Anaxa- 
goras. Nevertheless you must not stop learning further- 
more from logic that all growing, coming into existence, 
living, and passing away is but a change of form. The 
causes of natural science are indeed not causes, but ef- 
fects of the universe. They are reasonable effects of 
reason in so far as the latter is not an isolated part, but 
interconnected with the universe. To repeat: Our in- 
tellect is not ours, it does not belong to man, but it to- 
gether with man belongs to the universe. Reason and the 
world, the true, the good, and the beautiful, together 



318 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

with Godhood which you shall not idolize but under- 
stand in the spirit and in the world, in truth and in 
reality, are all one thing, one being, and everywhere 
eternal and the same. 

Socrates shows that he has as yet only a narrow an- 
thropomorphic, not a cosmic conception of the "best and 
good" and of reason. He was dominated by the preju- 
dice which still holds sway over the uncultured believers 
in God, that reason is older than all the rest of the world, 
that it is the ruling and antecedent creator. Our concep- 
tion of logic, on the other hand, teaches that the spirit 
which we have in our brain is but the emanation of the 
world spirit. And this latter must not be conceived as a 
nebulous world monster, not as an enormous spirit, but 
as the actual universe, which in spite of all change and 
all variation is eternally one, true, good, reasonable, real, 
and supreme. 



TWENTY-FOURTH LETTER 

The art of thought, my son, for which we are striv- 
ing, is not pure and abstract, but connected with prac- 
tice, a practical theory, a theoretical practice. It is not a 
separate and isolated thing, not a "thing in itself," but is 
connected with all things ; it has a universal interrela- 
tion. Hence our logic, as we have repeatedly stated, is 
a philosophy, world wisdom, and metaphysics. I include 
the latter, because our logic excludes nothing, not even 
the transcendental. It teaches that everything, even 
transcendentalism, if practiced with consciousness and 
the necessary moderation, and at- the right time and place, 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 319 

for instance at the carnival, is a reasonable and sublime 
pleasure. 

All prominent philosophers were explorers and users 
of the same art of thought, of living-, of viewing the 
world, although many of them retired to the solitude and 
were ascetics. Can the world be understood in a hermi- 
tage? Yes and no. After you have been traveling and 
seeing many lands, it is well to retire and classify the 
impressions received, and thus to reflect about a true 
philosophy of life. In this way, secluded thought, in the 
relative meaning of the word, that is, in connection with 
observation and experience, with enjoyment and life, is 
a veritable savior. Body and soul belong together, and 
if they are separated, it must be remembered that such 
a separation is a mere matter of form, that they are in 
fact one thing, attributes of the same being which is in- 
finitely great, so great that all other beings are but its 
fringes. 

The art of distinction distinguishes the infinite in- 
finitely with the consciousness that in reality everything 
is interrelated without distinction and is one. 

This truth, and thus absolute truth, is ignored by lay- 
men and professional authorities alike. The thousand 
year dualism between body and soul has been especially 
instrumental in preventing the understanding of the uni- 
versal interrelation. The whole history of philosophy is 
but a wrestling with the dualism between matter and 
mind. It was only by degrees that it moved towards its 
monistic goal. 

After the brilliant triple star Socrates-Flato-Aris- 
totle was extinguished, the philosophical sky was covered 
with dark clouds. The heathens stepped from the stage, 
and Christianity and the dogmas of its church predom- 



320 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

inated the logic of men, until at last a new scientific light 
arose in the beginning of modern times. It was especially 
Cartesius and Spinoza who were most brilliant among 
the early thinkers that emancipated their minds slowly 
and under great difficulties. Spinoza, of Jewish descent, 
is especially interesting in his fight against narrow- 
mindedness and for a universal philosophy. He wrote 
an "Essay on the Improvement of the Intellect and on the 
Way by which it is best led to a true Understanding of 
Things." He, as well as we, was looking for the best way, 
the true way, the way of truth. He, as well as we, seeks 
to study and practice the fundamentals of the art of 
thought. 

He begins : "After experience has taught me that 
everything which the ordinary life offers is vain, and I 
have seen that everything which I feared is only good or 
bad in so far as the mind is moved by it, I finally resolved 
to investigate whether there is any true good — whether 
there is anything the discovery of which will forever se- 
cure continuous and supreme joy. What is most generally 
found in life, and what mankind regards as the highest 
good, may be reduced to three things, viz., wealth, honor, 
and sensual pleasure." 

After Spinoza has then uncovered the shadowy side 
and the vanity of these popular ideals, he calls them "un- 
safe by their very nature," while he is looking for "per- 
manent good," which is ''insecure only as regards its 
possession, but not in its nature." 

But how is that to be found ? 

"Here I shall say shortly what I mean by true good, 
and what is at the same time the highest good. In order 
to grasp this fully, we must remember that good or bad 
are only relative terms, and thus the same thing may be 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 321 

called good or bad according to its relations, or on the 
other hand perfect or imperfect.' 

Spinoza, forestalling the object of his research, dis- 
covers that the true, supreme and permanent good is the 
"understanding of the unity" of the soul with the entire 
nature. "This then," he says, "is the goal which I am 
coveting." 

"To this end, we must study morals, philosophy, and 
the education of boys, and combine with this study the 
entire science of medicine, because health materially assists 
us in reaching our ideal. Neither must mechanics be 
neglected, because many difficult things are made easy 
by art. Above all we must strive to find a way for the 
improvement of the intellect." 

Here we have once more arrived at the pivotal point 
of our subject, my dear disciple. Who or what is the in- 
tellect, whence does it come from, whither does it lead? 
Answer : It is a light which does not shine within itself, 
but throws rays outside of itself for the illumination of 
the world. For this reason the science which has the 
faculty of understanding for its object, though a limited, 
is at the same time a universal science, a universal world 
wisdom. 

But isn't it a contradiction that a special science wants 
to be general world wisdom ? Is not general wisdom that 
which comprises all knowledge, all special science? Must 
I not know everything in order to be world wise? And 
how can any single brain assume to acquire all knowl- 
edge, to know everything ? Answer : It is impossible for 
you to know everything; but you can rise to the under- 
standing that your special wisdom and that of all others 
is a part of universal wisdom and form together a rela- 
tive whole which in connection with all the rest of the 



322 LETTERS ON LOGIC 

world constitute the absolute being. This understand- 
ing represents pure logic and is universal understand- 
ing, understanding of the universal being. 

Do not be troubled by the fact that Socrates was look- 
ing for virtue and the "best," or Spinoza for permanent 
and supreme joy, and that their wisdom aimed only at 
the narrow circle of human life, without rising to the 
cosmic interrelation. The means and the instrument by 
the help of which they strive for their ideal is the intel- 
lect. It is quite natural that intellectual research led to 
the study of the intellect, to the "improvement of the 
intellect," to the "critique of reason," to "logic," and 
finally to the understanding that the faculty of thought 
is an inseparable part of the monistic whole, of the ab- 
solute which lends support, consistency, reason and sense 
to all thought. 

On his exploring tour for the improvement of the in- 
tellect, Spinoza picks up a remark which seems to me 
worthy of closer attention. He says in so many words: 
If we are looking for a way to improve the intellect, is it 
not necessary for the purpose of finding such a way to 
first improve the intellect, in order to be at all able to 
discern the way which leads to an improvement of the 
intellect, and so on without end? "We must have a 
hammer to forge the iron, and in order to have a ham- 
mer, it must be made; but for this purpose we need 
another hammer and other instruments, and so forth 
without end. In this way it must not be proven that 
men have no power to forge iron. Men have rather ac- 
complished only the easiest tasks with difficulty and im- 
perfectly by the help of the natural tools of their bodies. 
Gradually they accomplished more difficult things with 



LETTERS ON LOGIC 323 

less labor and better. And thus they slowly proceeded 
from the simplest tasks to the instruments." 

I admire in this process of reasoning the brilliant 
understanding that the hammer is not such a limited in- 
strument as the untrained human brain thinks. It thinks 
that a hammer is not a pair of tongs. But Spinoza says 
that the bare fist is a hammer when used for striking, 
much more a stone or a club. A pair of tongs used to 
drive a nail becomes a hammer ; a hammer which I use 
to draw a nail becomes a pair of tongs. Fist or club, 
sense or nonsense, all is one. In other words, things 
are separated, but never so far as the fantastical dreamers 
think. Just as hammer and tongs, saw and file, 
are parts of the class of tools, so all things are parts 
of the one and absolute universe. Recognize, then, dear 
Eugene, that the relative and the absolute are not sepa- 
rated by such a bridgeless chasm, that the one should be 
praised to the skies and the other damned to the lowest 
pit. Understand that everything is dialectically inter- 
related, that the infinite, eternal, divine, can live only in 
the finite, special things, and that on the other hand the 
parts of the world can exist only in the absolute. In 
short, raise your conception to the universal conception, 
and at the same time, understand the supreme being 
in all its parts instead of idolizing it. 



The Positive Outcome of Philosophy 

BY JOSEPH DIETZGEN 
Translated by Ernest Untermann 



THE POSITIVE OUTCOME 
OF PHILOSOPHY 

PREFACE 

As a father cares for his child, so an author cares for 
his product. I may be able to give a little additional zest 
to the contents of this work by adding an explanation 
how I came to write it. 

Although born by my mother in 1828, I did not enter 
my own world until "the mad year," 1848. I was learn- 
ing the trade of my father in my paternal shop, when I 
saw in the "Kolnische Zeitung," how the people of Ber- 
lin had overcome the King of Prussia and conquered 
"liberty." This "liberty" now became the first object of 
my musings. The parties of that period, the disturbers 
and howlers, made a great deal of fuss about it. But 
the more I heard about it, and hence became enthusiastic 
over it, the duller, hazier and more indistinct became the 
meaning of it, so that it turned things upside down in 
my head. The psychologists have long known that en- 
thusiasm for a cause and understanding of that cause are 
two different things. Mark, for instance, the zeal dis- 
played by Catholic peasants in singing their mass, al- 
though they do not understand a word of Latin. 

What is meant by political freedom? What is its 
beginning, what its end ? Where and how are we to find 
a positive and definite knowledge of it? In the parties of 

327 



THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

the middle, the so-called "constitutionals," as well as 
among the bourgeois democrats, there was no end of 
dissension. Nothing could be learned there. Among 
them, as among the Protestants, every one was a chosen 
interpreter of the gospel. 

However, the papers of the extremes, that is, the 
"Neue Preussische" with its "For God, King and Father- 
land." and the "Neue Rheinische," the organ of "Dem- 
ocracy." gave me a hint that liberty had some sort of 
a material basis. During the following years, my life in 
rural surroundings gave me leisure to follow this scent. 
On one side, it was the work of men like Gerlach, Stahl, 
and Leo, on the other of Marx and Engels, that gave 
me a foothold. 

Though the communists and the ultra-conservatives 
came to widely different conclusions, still I felt and read 
between the lines that both of these extreme parties based 
their demands on one fundamental premise. They knew 
what they wanted ; they both had a definite beginning and 
end. And that permitted the assumption that both had a 
common philosophy. The Prussian landholding aris- 
tocracy based the cross, which they wore as an 
emblem on their hats, on the historically acquired royal 
military power and on the positive divine revelation of 
the Bible printed in black and supported by the ecclesi- 
astical police force dressed in black. And the Communist 
point of departure was quite as positive, unquestionable 
and material, viz., the growing supremacy of the mass 
of the people with their proletarian interests based on 
the historically acquired productive power of the working 
class. The spirit of both of these hostile camps was de- 
scending from the results of philosophy, primarily from 
the Hegelian school. Both of them were armed with the 



PREFACE 329 

philosophical achievements of the century, which they 
had not only mechanically assimilated, but rather con- 
tinually provided with fresh food like a living being. 

In the beginning of the fifties, a pamphlet was pub- 
lished by one of the cross bearers, Stahl, entitled "Against 
Bunsen." This Bunsen was at the time the Prussian Em- 
bassador at London, a crony of the ruling Prussian King 
Frederic William IV., and, apart from this, nothing but 
a liberal muddle head who was interested in political 
and religious tolerance. 

The pamphlet of the cross bearer Stahl attacked this 
tolerance and demonstrated valiantly that tolerance could 
be preached only by a muddled free lance to whom religion 
and fatherland were indifferent conceptions. Religious 
faith, so far as it is truth, so he said, has a true power and 
can transpose mountains. Such a faith could not be tol- 
erant and indifferent, but must push its propaganda with 
fire and sword. 

In the same way in which Stahl defended the inter- 
ests of the landed aristocracy, the philosopher Feuerbach 
spoke in the interest of the infidel revolutionaries. Both 
of them were to that extent in accord with the "Com- 
munist Manifesto" that they no longer regarded Liberty 
as a phantasmagoria, but as a being of flesh and blood. 

When I had realized this, it dawned upon me that 
any conception elucidated by philosophy, in this case the 
idea of liberty, had this peculiarity : Liberty is as yet an 
abstract idea. In order to become real, it must assume 
a concrete, special form. 

Political freedom as a glittering generality is a thing 
of no reality. Under such fantastic ideal the constitu- 
tionalists or the liberals conceal the liberty of the money 
bag. Under these circumstances, they are quite right in 



330 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

demanding German unity with Prussia as a head, or a 
republic with a grand duke at the top. The landed aris- 
tocracy also are right in demanding the liberty of that 
aristocracy. And the Communists are still more right, 
for they demand the liberty that will guarantee bread 
and butter for the mass of the people and will fully set 
free all the forces of production. 

From this experience and conclusion it follows that 
true liberty and the highest right are composed of in- 
dividual liberties and rights, that are opposed to one an- 
other without being inconceivable. It is easy to proceed 
from this premise to the rule of thought laid down in 
this work, that the brain need not make any excursions 
into the transcendental in order to find his way through 
the contradictions of the real world. 

In this way I passed from politics to philosophy, and 
from philosophy to the theory of positive knowledge 
which I presented to the public in 18G9 in my little 
work "The Nature of Human Brain Work." Further 
studies on the general powers of understanding have 
added to my special knowledge of this subject, so that I 
am now enabled to fill the old wine into a new bottle 
instead of publishing a new edition of my old work. 

The science which I present in the following pages is 
very limited in its circumference, but all the better 
founded and important in its consequences. This, I trust, 
will be accepted as a sufficient excuse for the recurring 
repetition of the same statements in a different form. My 
remaining confined to a single point requires no apology. 
What is left undone by one, is bequeathed as a problem 
to others. 

There might be some dispute over the question, how 
much of this positive achievement of philosophy is due 



PREFACE 331 

to the author and to his predecessors. But that is an in- 
terminable task of small concern. No matter who hoisted 
the calf out of the well, so long as it is out. Anyway, 
this whole work treats of the concatenation and inter- 
dependence of things, and this also throws a bright light 
on the question of mine and thine. 

J. DlETZGEN. 

Chicago, March 30, 1887. 



THE POSITIVE OUTCOME 
OF PHILOSOPHY 



i 



POSITIVE KNOWLEDGE AS A SPECIAL OBJECT 

That which we call science nowadays was known to 
our ancestors by a name which then sounded very re- 
spectable and distinguished, but which has in the mean- 
time acquired a somewhat ludicrous taste, the name of 
wisdom. This gradual transition of wisdom into science 
is a positive achievement of philosophy which well de- 
serves our attention. 

The term "ancestors" is very indefinite. It comprises 
people who lived more than three thousand years ago as 
well as those who died less than a hundred years ago. 
And a wise man was still respected a hundred years ago, 
while to-day that title always implies a little ridicule and 
disrespect. 

The wisdom of our ancestors is so old that it has not 
even a date. It reaches back, the same as the origin of 
language, to the period when man developed from the 
animal world. But if we call a wise man, in the language 
of our day, a philosopher, then it is at once plain that 
wisdom is descended from the ancient Greeks. This 
wonderful nation produced the first philosophers. 

Whether this term indicates a man who loves wisdom 
or one who loves science, is of little moment to-day, and 



334 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

there was no such distinction in ancient times. We re- 
member that it was entirely undecided among the Greeks 
whether a mathematician, an astronomer, a physician, an 
orator, or a student of the art of living deserved the title 
of a philosopher. These professions were not clearly 
distinguished. They were wrapped up one in another 
like the embryo in a mother's womb. While humanity 
had still little knowledge, a man might well be wise. But 
to-day it is necessary to specialize, to devote one's self 
to a special science, because the field of exploration has 
grown so extended. The philosopher of to-day is no 
longer a wise man, but a specialist. 

The stars are the objects of astronomy, the animals 
of zoology, the plants of botany. Who and what are 
now the objects of philosophy? This may be explained 
in one word to an expert. But if we try to give informa- 
tion to the general public, the matter becomes difficult. 

What do I know about the shoe industry, if I know 
that it produces shoes ? I know something general about 
it, but I have no knowledge of its details. It is impossible 
to give sufficient information on the details of shoemak- 
ing to any one in a few words, not even to an educated 
person. Neither is it possible to explain the object of 
philosophy in such a way. The object may be stated, but 
not explained, for it cannot be made plain and brought 
home to the understanding in a few words. 

That is the word, understanding. The understand- 
ing is the object of philosophy. 

We must at once call the reader's attention to the 
ambiguity of this term. Understanding, knowledge, is 
the object of all science. That is nothing special. Every 
study seeks to enlighten the brain. But philosophy 
wishes to be a science and does not desire to relapse into 



POSITIVE KNOWLEDGE AS A SPECIAL OBJECT 335 

antiquity by becoming universal wisdom. To say that 
understanding is the object of philosophy is to give 
merely the same reply which Thales, Pythagoras, or 
Plato would have given. Has proud philosophy gained 
nothing since? What is its positive achievement? That 
is the question. 

Philosophy to-day still has understanding for its ob- 
ject. But it is no longer indefinite understanding which 
tries to embrace everything, but rather the understanding 
of the method by which knowledge may be gained. 
Philosophy now wishes to learn how it comes to pass 
that other objects may be illumined by the mind. To 
speak plainly, it is no longer the understanding which 
seeks to know everything as it did at the time of Socrates 
that is now the special study of philosophy, but rather 
the mind itself, its method and the perceptive powers of 
thought and understanding. 

If this were all, if the world's wise men had done 
nothing but to at last find the object of philosophy, it 
would be a very scanty achievement. No, the harvest is 
much richer. The present day theory of human under- 
standing is a real science, which well deserves to be 
popularized. Our ancestors sought understanding after 
the manner of Socrates and Plato in the entrails of the 
human brain, while at the same time despising the ex- 
perience outside of it. They hoped to find truth by 
cudgeling their brain. "Honor to Socrates, honor to 
Plato ; but still more honor to Truth !" 

Aristotle showed a little more interest in the outer 
world. With the downfall of the old social stage the old 
philosophy naturally succumbed also. It did not revive 
until a few hundred years ago, at the beginning of mod- 
ern times. 



336 E POSITIVE outcome of philosophy 

A short while ago, Shakespeare attracted much atten- 
tion, when some one claimed to have discovered that it 
was not he who wrote those famous dramas and trage- 
dies, but his contemporary Bacon of Verulam, Lord 
Chancellor of England. Whether Shakespeare keeps 
his laurels or not, Bacon's name is still great enough, 
for it is generally accepted as the mile stone of modern 
philosophy. 

One might say that philosophy was asleep from the 
time of Aristotle to that of Bacon. At least it produced 
no remarkable results during that period, and it- cannot 
be denied that philosophy from ancient Greek days to 
the present times moved in a mystic fog which detracted 
much from its study in the eyes of educated and honest 
men. But the philosophers themselves are less to blame 
for this than the concealment of the object. Only after 
the entire social development has furthered the human 
understanding to the point where it can benefit from the 
light spread by the various branches of science, does 
philosophy become conscious of its special object and 
able to separate its positive achievements from the rub- 
bish of the past. 

If we compare the old Grecian wisdom with modern 
science, the outcome of philosophy looks insignificant by 
the side of the achievements of science. Nevertheless, 
great as the value of the aggregate product of science 
may be, it is composed of individual values, and every one 
of its parts is worthy of consideration. The method, 
the way, the form, in which the mind arrives at its prac- 
tical creations is one of these parts. The mind, on its 
march from ignorance to its present wealth has not only 
gathered a treasury of knowledge, but also improved its 
methods, so that the further constructive work of sci- 



POSITIVE KNOWLEDGE AS A SPECIAL OBJECT 837 

ence proceeds faster now. Who will fail to recognize 
that material production has accumulated a treasure in 
the methods by which it produces to-day, which is by no 
means of less value than the accumulated national wealth 
itself? The positive outcome of philosophy bears the 
same relation to the v/ealth of science. 



II 

THE POWER OF COGNITION IS KIN TO THE UNIVERSE 

The way of Truth, or the true way, is not musing, but 
the conscious connection of our thoughts with the actual 
life — that is the quintessence of the teachings of phi- 
losophy produced by evolution. But this is not every- 
thing. If I know that a tanner makes leather, I do not 
by any means know everything he does, because there 
still remains the manner and method of his manipulations. 
In the same way, the doctrine of the interrelation of 
mind and matter, which is the product of the entire so- 
cial development, requires a better and more specific 
substantiation, so that its true quality as a positive 
achievement of philosophy, or of the theory of knowledge 
may be better understood. If the matter is represented 
in this bare manner — it does, indeed, resemble the egg of 
Columbus — one does not see why so much should be 
made of it. But if we enter into the details that have 
produced the result, we do not only learn to better re- 
spect the prominent philosophers, but their works also 
reveal a rich mine of fecial and comprehensive knowl- 
edge. 



338 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

All sciences are closely related, for advances in one 
branch are preparations for advances in others. As- 
tronomy is unthinkable without mathematics and optics. 
Every science has begun unscientifically, and in the 
course of the accumulation of individual knowledge a 
more or less exact systematic organization of this knowl- 
edge has resulted. Xo science has as yet arrived at com- 
pleteness and perfectness. We have as yet more the 
results of experimental effort than accomplished perfec- 
tion. Philosophy is no better off in this respect. We 
rather believe we are doing something to overcome a 
deeply rooted prejudice when we state that philosophy 
is no worse off than other sciences, so long as we suc- 
ceed in ascertaining that it has accomplished positive 
results and in pointing them out. 

It is a positive accomplishment of philosophy that 
mankind to-day has a clear and unequivocal conception 
of the necessity of the division of labor as a means of 
being successful. Our present day philosophers no 
longer make excursions into dreamland in the quest of the 
True, the Beautiful, and the Good, as did the ancients. 
The True, the Beautiful, and the Good, are nevertheless 
the objects of all modern science, only, thanks to evolu- 
tion, these objects are now sought by special means. And 
the clear consciousness of this condition of things is a 
philosophical consciousness. 

It is a part of the theory of understanding to know 
that in order to accomplish something one must limit 
oneself to a specialty. That is a fundamental demand 
for the use of common sense, which the primitive musing 
brain did not realize. Thinking must be done with wide 
open and active eyes, with alert senses, not with closed 
eyes or fixed gaze. This is a part of logic. We do not 



THE POWER OF COGNITION 339 

deny that men have always done their thinking by means 
of the senses. We only claim that they did not do so 
from principle, otherwise the old complaint about the un- 
reliability of the senses as a means of knowledge would 
not have lived so long. Neither would the inner man 
have been so excessively overestimated, nor abstract 
thought so much celebrated, just as if it alone were the 
child of nobler birth. I do not wish to detract from the 
merits of the power of abstraction, but I simply claim 
that the clay of which Adam was made was no less divine 
than the spiritual breath that gave him his life. Nor do 
I mean that it is due to philosophy alone that mankind 
learned not to strain "understanding" in abstract vapor- 
ings, but instead to introduce the division of labor and 
to take up the various specialties with open senses. The 
technique of understanding is the product of the entire 
movement of civilization, and as such a positive accom- 
plishment of philosophy. The total process of evolution 
has placed the philosophers on their feet. 

There is no doubt that up to the present time, phi- 
losophy partook more of the character of a desire and love 
of science than of world wisdom. This wisdom does not 
amount to much, even to-day. This is plainly demon- 
strated by the dissensions of the educated and unedu- 
cated on all questions pertaining to wisdom of life. Soc- 
rates in the market of Athens, and Plato in his dialogues, 
have probably said better things about the questions: 
"What is virtue? What is justice? What is moral and 
reasonable?" than the professors of philosophy would 
know how to say to-day. Kant has well said that the 
unanimity of the experts is the test by which one may 
decide what is a scientific fact and what is mere dispute. 
From this it is easy to judge that wisdom of life is still 



310 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

in a bad way and will have to wait for its scientific 
transformation. 

We declared understanding itself to be the special 
object of philosophy and shall now attempt to outline the 
results so far obtained by it. 

One of the first requirements for the education of 
the object of philosophy is to recall its various names. 
The understanding, or the power of knowledge, is also 
called intelligence, intellect, mind, spirit, reason, power 
of cognition, of conception, of distinction, of imagination, 
of judgment, and of drawing conclusions. The attempt 
has frequently been made to analyze understanding or 
to dissect it into its various parts and to specialize them 
by the help of those names. Especially logic knows how 
to give particular explanations of what is imagination, 
a conception, a judgment, and a conclusion. It has even 
divided these sections into subsections, so that a trained 
logician might reproach me with being ignorant for ap- 
plying various names to intelligence, because only the 
common people confound those names and use them as 
synonyms, while science has long used them in their 
proper order for designating special parts of intelligence. 

To such a reproach, I answer that Aristotle and the 
subsequent formal logicians have made some pretty 
pointed observations and excellent arrangements in this 
field. But these proved to be premature or inadequate, 
because the observations on which the ancient intellec- 
tual explorers relied were too scanty. This scantiness 
of the observations made in regard to intelligence, and 
by intelligence, has kept the human race in the mazes of 
intellectual bondage and by this mysticism has even pre- 
vented the most advanced minds from penetrating deeper 
into this obscure question. The history of philosophy is 



THE POWER OF COGNITION 341 

not the history of a useless struggle, but yet a history of 
a hard struggle with the question: What is, what does, 
of what parts consists, and of what nature is understand- 
ing, intelligence, reason, intellect, etc. ? So long as this 
question is unsettled, the questioner is entitled to dis- 
pense with any and all sections and subsections of the in- 
tellectual object and to regard the various names as 
synonymous. 

The main accomplishment in the solution of this ques- 
tion is the ever clearer and preciser knowledge of our 
days that the nature of the human intellect is of the same 
kind, genus or quality as the whole of nature. In order 
that the theory of understanding may be able to eluci- 
date this point, it must divest itself, more or less, of the 
character of a speciality and occupy itself with all of 
nature, assume the character of cosmogony. 

It is principally an achievement of philosophy that we 
now know definitely and down to the minutest detail 
that the human mind is a definite and limited part of the 
unlimited universe. 

Just as a piece of oak wood has the twofold quality of 
partaking not alone, with its oaken nature, of the general 
nature of wood, but also of the unlimited generality of all 
nature, so is the intellect a limited specialty, which has 
the quality of being universal as a part of the universe 
and of being conscious of its own and of all universality. 
The boundless universal cosmic nature is embodied in 
the intellect, in the animal as well as in man, the same as 
it is embodied in the oak wood, in all other wood, in all 
matter and force. The worldly monistic nature which is 
mortal and immortal, limited and unlimited, special and 
general, all in one, is found in everything, and every- 



342 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

thing is found in nature — understanding or the power of 
knowledge is no exception. 

It is this twofold nature of the universe, this being 
at the same time limited and unlimited, this reflection of 
its eternal essence and eternal truth in changing phe- 
nomena., which has rendered its understanding very dif- 
ficult for the human mind. This intricate quality has 
been represented by religion in the fantastic picture of 
two worlds, separating the temporal from the eternal, the 
limited from the unlimited, too unreasonably far. But 
nowadays the indestructibility of matter and the eternity 
of material forces is a matter of fact accepted by natural 
science. 

The positive outcome of philosophy, then, is the 
knowledge of the monistic way in which the seeming 
duality of the universe is active in the human under- 
standing. 



Ill 

AS TO HOW THE INTELLECT IS LIMITED AND UNLIMITED 

Understanding taught by experience no longer muses 
about universal nature, but acquires a knowledge of it by 
special studies. By degrees philosophy, first uncon- 
sciously and lately clearly and plainly, has taken up the 
problem of ascertaining the limits of understanding. 

This philosophical problem first assumed the form of 
polemics. It became opposed to the religious dogma 
which represented the human mind as a small, subser- 
vient, limited and restricted emanation of the unlimited 
divine spirit. This terrestrial emanation was regarded 



INTELLECT LIMITED AND UNLIMITED 343 

as too limited to understand and find its divine source. 
The study of the limits of the understanding has now 
emancipated itself from this dogma, but not to such an 
extent that there is no longer any mysterious obscurity 
floating around the understanding and intelligence, and 
especially around the question whether the human mind 
can penetrate only into some things while others will re- 
main in the unscrutable darkness of faith and intuition, 
or whether it may penetrate boldly and without hind- 
rance into the infinity of the physical and chemical uni- 
verse. 

We here desire to claim as a positive outcome of 
philosophy that it has at last acquired the clear and ex- 
act knowledge that a socalled infinite spirit, in the re- 
ligious sense, is a fantastic, unscientific conception. In 
the natural sense of the word, the human powers of 
understanding are universal and yet in spite of their 
universality they are, quite naturally, limited. The 
human understanding has its limits, why should it 
not? Only drop the illusion that a dark mystery is 
concealed beyond these limits. 

The understanding is a force among others, and 
everything that is located alongside of other things is 
limited and restricted by them. We can understand 
everything, but we can also touch, see, hear, feel, and 
taste everything. We also have the power of moving 
about, and other qualities. One art limits another, and 
yet each is unlimited in its own field. The various 
human powers belong together and constitute together 
the human wealth. Be careful not to separate the 
power of understanding from other natural powers. 
In a certain sense it must be separated, because it is 
the special object of our study, but it must always be 



3-11 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

remembered that such a separation has only a theoret- 
ical value. 

Just as our power of vision can see everything, so 
our understanding can grasp everything. 

Let us look a little closer at this statement. 

How can we see everything? Not from any single 
standpoint. In that sense our powers of vision are 
limited. But what is not visible in the distance, be- 
comes so on approaching nearer to it. What one eye 
cannot see, that of others can, and what is invisible to 
the naked eye. is revealed by the telescope and micro- 
scope. Nevertheless the vision remains limited, even 
though it ma}- be the sharpest, and armed with the 
best artificial means. Even if we regard all the eyes 
of the past and future generations of humanity as 
organs of the universal human vision, this vision still 
remains limited. Nevertheless, no one will complain 
about the limits of human power, because we cannot 
see sounds with our eyes or hear the light with our 
ears. 

The understanding of man is limited, just as his 
vision is. The eye can look through a glass pane, but 
not through a plate of iron. Yet no one will call any 
eye limited, because it cannot see through a block of 
metal. These drastic examples are very opportune, 
because there are certain wise men who reflectively 
lay their finger on their nose and call attention to the 
limits of our intellect in that sense, just as if the 
knowledge gained on earth by scientific means were 
only a nominal, not a real, understanding and know- 
ing. The human intellect is thus degraded to the posi- 
tion of a substitute of some "higher" intellect which 
is not discovered, but must be "believed" to exist in 



INTELLECT LIMITED AND UNLIMITED 345 

the small head of a fairy or in the large head of an 
almighty being above the clouds. Would any one 
try to make us believe that there is a great and 
almighty eye that can look through blocks of metal the 
same as through glass? The idea of a spiritual organ 
with an infinite understanding is just as senseless. An 
unlimited single thing, an unlimited single being, is 
impossible, unless we regard the whole world, the 
world without beginning and without end, the infinite 
world, as a unit. Within this world everything is sub- 
ject to change, but nothing can go beyond its genus 
without losing its name and character. There are 
various kinds of fire, but none that does not burn, none 
which has not the general nature of fire. Neither is 
there any water without the general nature of water, 
nor a spirit that is elevated above the general nature 
of spirits. In our days of clear conceptions the ten- 
dency toward the transcendental is mere fantastic 
vaporing. 

It is not alone unscientific, it is fantastic, to think 
even afar of a higher power of thought or understand- 
ing than the human one. One might as well think of 
a higher horse which runs with eight, sixteen, or six- 
teen hundred legs and carries away his rider in a 
higher air at a higher speed than that of the wind or 
the light. 

It is a part of the achievements of philosophy, of 
correct methods of thought, of the art of thought or 
dialectics, to know that we must use all conceptions, 
without exception, in a limited, rational, commonplace 
way, unless we wish to stray into that region where 
there are mountains without valleys and where every 
theory of understanding loses its mind. 



:;ii; THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

It is true that all things, including our understand- 
ing, may be improved. Everything develops, why 
should not our intellects do so? At the same time 
we may know a priori that our intellect must remain 
limited, of course not limited in the sense of the dunce, 
just as our eyes will never become so sharp that they 
can see through metal blocks. Every individual has 
its limited brain, but humanity, so the positive achieve- 
ments of philosophy have shown, has an intellect of 
as universal a power as any that can be imagined, re- 
quired, or found, in heaven or on earth. 

YYe maintain that philosophy so far has acquired 
something positive, has left us a legacy, and that this 
consists in a clear revelation of the method of using 
our intellect in order to produce excellent pictures of 
nature and its phenomena. 

For the purpose of making the reader familiar with 
this method, with this legacy of philosophy, we must 
enter more closely into the essence of the instrument 
which lifts all the treasures of science. We are espe- 
cially interested in the question, whether it is a finite 
or infinite and universal instrument with which we go 
fishing for truth. It is the custom to belittle the facul- 
ties of the human understanding, in order to keep it 
under the supremacy of the divine metaphysical 
augurs. It is quite easy to see, therefore, that the 
question of the essence of our powers of understanding 
is intimately related to, or even identical with, the 
question of how we may be permitted to use them, 
whether they should be used only for the investigation 
of the limited, finite, or also for the study of the 
eternal, infinite, and immeasurable. 

We object here to the tendency of belittling the 



INTELLECT LIMITED AND UNLIMITED 347 

human mind. About a hundred years ago, the philos- 
opher Kant found it appropriate to draw the sword 
against those who played fast and lose with the human 
mind, against the socalled metaphysicians. They had 
made a miraculous thing of the instrument of thought, 
a matter for effusions. In order to be able clearly to 
state the outcome of philosophy, we must acquaint the 
reader with the fact that this instrument of thought, in 
its way, is one of the best and most magnificent things 
in existence, but that, at the same time, it is bound to 
its general kind or genus. The human understanding 
perceives quite perfectly, but we must not have an 
exaggerated idea of its perfection, any more than we 
would of a perfect eye or ear, that, be they ever so per- 
fect, cannot see the grass grow or hear the fleas cough. 

God is a spirit, says the bible, and God is infinite. 
If he is a spirit, an intellect, such as man, then it would 
be fair to assume that man's intellect is also infinite, 
or even is the divine spirit itself which has taken up its 
abode in the human brains. People cudgeled their 
brains with such confused conceptions, so long as the 
object of modern philosophy, the intellect, was a mys- 
tery. Now it is recognized as a finite, natural phe- 
nomenon, an energy or a force which is not the infinite, 
though it is, like all other matter and force, a part of 
the infinite, eternal, immeasurable. 

Leaving all religious notions aside, the infinite, im- 
measurable, eternal, is not personal, but objective; it 
is no longer referred to as a masculine, but as a neuter. 
It may be called by many names, such as the universe, 
the cosmos, or the world. In order to understand 
clearly that the spirit which we have in our minds, is 
a finite part of the world, we must get a little better 



348 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

acquainted with this infinite, eternal world. Our 
physical world cannot have any other world beside it,* 
because it is the universe. Within the universe there 
are many worlds, which all of them make out the 
cosmos, which has neither a beginning nor an end in 
time and space. The cosmos reaches across all time 
and space, "in heaven and on earth, and everywhere." 
But how do 1 know what I state in such an offhand 
manner? Well, the knowledge of the universe, of the 
infinite, is given to us partly by birth and partly by 
experience. This knowledge is inherent in man just as 
language is, viz., in the germ, and experience gives us 
a proof of the infinite in a negative way, for we never 
learn the beginning or the end of anything. On the 
contrary, experience has shown us positively that all 
socalled beginnings and ends are only interconnections 
of the infinite, immeasurable, inexhaustible, and un- 
fathomable universe. Compared to the wealth of the 
cosmos the intellect is only a poor fellow. However, 
this does not prevent it from being the most perfect 
instrument for clearly and plainly reflecting the finite 
phenomena of the infinite universe. 



IV 

THE UNIVERSALITY OF NATURE 

The positive outcome of philosophy concerns itself 
with specifying the nature of the human mind. It 
shows that this special nature of mind does not occupy 
an exceptional position, but belongs with the whole of 
nature in the same organization. In order to show 



THE UNIVERSALITY OF NATURE 349 

this, philosophy must not discuss the human mind as 
if it were something separate from nature, but must 
rather deal with its general nature. And since this 
general nature of our intellect is the same of which 
every other thing partakes, it follows that nature in 
general, or the universe, or the cosmos, all of which is 
the same thing, are an indispensable object in the 
special study of the nature of the human mind. 

We have already said that the experienced under- 
standing of the present day no longer muses over 
nature in general in the fantastic and mere introspec- 
tive manner as of old, but rather seeks to obtain a 
knowledge of it by special study. In so doing we do 
not forget that the study of specialties at the same 
time throws a light on the general relation of things, 
of which every species is but a part. 

Since the human mind is a part of the whole of 
nature, viz., that part which has the desire and longing 
to obtain a conception of all the other parts, and more 
than that, to understand the interconnection between 
the parts and the undivided and infinite whole, it is 
easy to comprehend the fact that the philosophers 
have occupied themselves so much with the most real 
and most perfect being. Whether this being was 
called God, or substance, or idea, or the absolute, or 
nature, or matter, all of these terms cannot prevent us 
today from approaching infinite nature with sober 
senses, in order to gain, by its help, a lifelike picture of 
the human intellect, which is not a mystical being, 
but a reasonable part of the same nature that lives rea- 
sonably and intelligibly in all other parts of nature. 

The inexperienced powers of distinction which did 
not understand their function, magnified the difference 



350 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

between the infinite and its finite phenomena out of 
nil proportion. Now that we have made the philo- 
sophical experience that the general as well as the 
special nature of the human intellect admits only of 
moderate and bounded distinctions, we arrive at the 
conclusion that the immeasurable, all-perfect, and 
eternal being- is composed of finite, commensurable, 
imperfect, and transient things in such a way that 
the universal being combines in itself all perfections 
as well as all imperfections. This contradictory uni- 
versal being, this nature to which all contradictory 
attributes may be simultaneously assigned, in a cer- 
tain sense puts the old rule to shame that you cannot 
at the same time affirm and deny the predicate of any 
subject. 

Nature comprises all and is all. Reason and unrea- 
son, being and not being, all these contradictions are 
contained in it. Outside of it there are no affirmations 
and no contradictions. Since the human mind eter- 
nally moves in affirmations and negations, in order to 
obtnin n clenr picture of things, it hns an interminable 
task in understanding the interminable object. 

Our brain is supposed to solve the contradictions of 
nature. If it knows enough about itself to renlize that 
it is not an exception from general nature, but a nat- 
ural part of the same whole — although it calls itself 
"spirit" — then it also knows and must know that its 
clearness can differ but moderately from the general 
confusion, that the solution of the problem cannot dif- 
fer materially from the problem itself. The contradic- 
tions are solved only by reasonable differentiation, 
only by the science of understanding which shows that 
extravagant differences are nothing but extravagant 



THE UNIVERSALITY OF NATURE 351 

speculations. The human understanding inclines to 
exaggerations in its untrained state, and it is a relic 
of untrained habits to differentiate in an absolute man- 
ner the spiritual from the rest of nature, to make a 
too extravagant distinction between it and the physi- 
cal body. It is the merit of philosophy to have given 
us a clear doctrine of the use of the intellect, and this 
doctrine culminates in the rule not to make exagger- 
ated, but only graduated distinctions. For this pur- 
pose it is necessary to realize that there is only one 
being and that all other socalled beings are but minor 
expressions of the same general being, which we desig- 
nate by the name of nature or universe. 

In consequence of the human bent to exaggeration, 
the human understanding has been regarded as a 
being of a different nature from that of natural beings 
which exist outside of the intellect. But it must be 
remembered that every part of nature is "another" in- 
dividual piece of it, and, furthermore, that every other 
and different part is really nothing different but a uni- 
form piece of the same general nature. The thing is 
mutual : The general nature exists only in its many 
individual parts, and these in their turn exist only in, 
with and by the general cosmic being. 

Nature which is divided by the human understand- 
ing into East and West, South and North, and into a 
hundred thousand other named parts, is yet an undi- 
vided whole of which we may say with certainty that 
it has as many innumerable beginnings and ends as it 
is without beginning and end, as it is the infinite itself. 
It is well known that there is nothing new under the 
sun. Nothing is created, nothing disappears, and yet 
there is a continuous change. 



353 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

The brain of man has a right and a left side, a top 
and a bottom, a front and a back part, an interior and 
an exterior. And the innermost of the brain again has 
two sides or qualities, a physical and a spiritual. They 
are so little divided that the term brain has two mean- 
ings, designating now the physical brain, now its men- 
tal functions. In speaking here exclusively of the 
mind, we tacitly assume its inseparable connection 
with the physical body. 

The material brain and the mental brain are two 
brains that together make one. Thus two, three, four, 
or innumerable things are yet one thing. The human 
understanding was endowed by nature with the faculty 
of embracing the infinite variety of the universe as 
a unit, as a single conception. The unity of nature is 
as true and real as its multiplicity. To say that many 
are one and one many is not nonsense, but simply a 
truism which becomes clear when understanding the 
positive outcome of philosophy. 

A reader unfamiliar with this our product of phil- 
osophy still follows the habit of regarding the physi- 
cal body as something different from the mind. A dis- 
tinction between these two is quite justified, but this 
manner of classification must not be overdone. The 
reader should remember that he also is in the habit of 
regarding such heterogeneous things as axes, scissors, 
and knives as children of the same family by referring 
to them collectively as cutting tools. The outcome of 
philosophy now demands that we apply the same 
method to the object of our special study, the human 
brain. We must henceforth eschew all effervescent 
flights of imagination and regard the powers of the 



THE UNIVERSALITY OF NATURE 353 

human mind as children of the same family as all other 
physical powers, whose immortal mother is the 
universe. 

The universe is infinite not alone in the matter of 
time and space, but also in that of the variety of its 
'products. The human brains which it produces are 
likewise internally and externally of an infinite differ- 
entiation, although this does not prevent them from 
forming- a common group uniform in its way. 

To group the phenomena of nature, the children of 
the universe, in such a way by classes, families, and 
species that they may be easily grasped, that is the 
task of the science of understanding, the work and 
constitution of the perceiving human brain. To under- 
stand simply means to obtain a general and at the 
same time a detailed view of the processes and prod- 
ucts of the universe by grouping them in a fashion 
similar to that used for the vegetable kingdom by 
botany and for the animal kingdom by zoology. It 
goes without argument that we, the limited children of 
the unlimited universe, are able to solve this problem 
only in a limited way. 

However, this natural physical limitation of the 
human understanding must not be confounded with 
the abject misery which slavish and sentimental meta- 
physics attribute to it. The infinite universe is by no 
means niggardly in its gifts to the human understand- 
ing. It opens its whole depths to our intellectual 
understanding and perception. Our intellect is a part 
of the inexhaustible universe and therefore partakes 
of its inexhaustible nature. That part of nature which 
is known by the name of intellect is limited only to 
the extent that the part is smaller than the whole. 



354 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

V 
THE UNDERSTANDING AS A PART OF THE HUMAN SOUL 

The human intellect or understanding, the special 
object of all philosophy, is a part, and in our case the 
most prominent part, of the human soul. Gustav Theo- 
dore Fechner, a forgotten star on the literary firma- 
ment, posed the question of the soul in his time and 
attempted to answer it. In so doing he clothed the 
result of past philosophies in a peculiar garb which 
looked fantastic enough at first sight. He regards the 
outcome of philosophy merely as an individual product 
and he is so full of veneration for the ancient terms, 
such as immortal souls, God, Chistimiity, that he does 
not care to dismiss them, no matter how roughly he 
handles their essence. 

Fechner extends the possession of a soul to human 
beings, animals, plants stones, planets ; in short, to the 
whole world. 

This is simply saying that the human soul is of the 
same nature as all the rest of the world, or vice versa, 
that all natural things have the same nature as the 
human soul. Not only animals, but also stones and 
planets have something analogous to our human soul. 

Fechner is not fantastic at bottom, and yet how 
fantastical it sounds to hear him say : "I went out 
walking on a spring morning. The fields were green, 
the birds were singing, the dew sparkled, the smoke 
rose toward the clouds. Here and there a human be- 
ing stirred. A glory of light was diffused over it all. 
It was only a small piece of the Earth. It was only 



THE UNDERSTANDING OF THE SOUL 355 

a short moment of its existence. And yet, as I took all 
this in with an ever-widening understanding, I felt not 
alone the beauty, but also the truth that it is an angel 
who is thus passing through the sky with his rich, 
fresh and blooming nature, his living face upturned 
to the heavens. And I asked myself how it is that 
man can ever become so stunted that he sees nothing 
but a dry clod in the Earth and looks for angels above 
and beyond it, never rinding them anywhere. But peo- 
ple call this sentimental dreaming." 

"The Earth is a globe, and what it is besides may 
be found in the museums of natural history." Thus 
writes Fechner. 

. Now there can be no objection to comparing the 
beautiful Earth and the stars around it with angels, 
any more than there can be to the lover calling his 
sweetheart an angel of God. The Earth, the Moon, 
and the stars are according to Fechner's terminology 
angelic beings with souls ; mediators between man 
and God. He knows very well that this is nothing but 
a matter of analogy and terminology, he is as atheistic 
as the most atheistic, but his fondness and reverence 
for the traditional terms lead him to attribute a soul to 
the material world and to give to this great and in- 
finite soul a divine name. 

If we waive this religious hobby of Fechner's, there 
still remains his peculiarity of using words and names 
in a symbolical sense. It is nothing but the old poetic 
way of calling a sweetheart's eyes heavenly stars and 
the stars of the blue heavens lovely eyes, which makes 
a snowy hill of a woman's breast, a zephyr of the wind, 
a nymph of a spring of water, and an erlking of an old 
willow tree. This poetic license has filled the whole 



dO() THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

world with good and evil spirits, mermaids, fairies, 
elfs, and goblins. 

This is not a bad way of speaking, so long as we 
keep in mind, like a poet, what we are doing and that 
we are consciously using symbolical terms. Fechner 
does this only to a certain extent. A little spleen re- 
mains in his brain. It is this spleen which I intend to 
deal with in the proper light, in order to thus demon- 
strate the outcome of philosophy. 

Fechner is not aware that his universal soul reflects 
only one half of our present outcome of philosophical 
study. The other half, which renders an understand- 
ing of the whole possible, consists in the perception 
that not only are all material things endowed with a 
soul, but that all souls, including the human ones, are 
ordinary things. 

Philosophy has not only deified the world and in- 
spired it with a soul, but has also secularized God and 
the souls. This is the whole truth, and each by itself 
is only a part. 

Apart from psychology, which treats of the indi- 
vidual human soul, there has lately arisen a "psychol- 
ogy of nations" which regards the individual souls as 
parts of the universal human soul, as individual pieces 
constituting an aggregate soul which, decidedly, is 
more than a simple aggregation of numbers. The 
soul of the psychology of nations has the same relation 
to the individual souls that modern political economy 
has to private economy. Prosperity in general is a dif- 
ferent question and deals with different matters than 
the amassing of wealth for your individual pocket. 
Granted that the national soul is essentially different 
from the individual soul, what would be the nature of 



THE UNDERSTANDING OF THE SOUL 357 

the universal animal soul, including the souls of lions, 
tigers, flies, elephants, mice, etc.? If we now extend 
the generalization farther and include in our psychol- 
ogy the vegetable and the mineral kingdom, the vari- 
ous world bodies, our solar system, and finally the 
whole universe, what else could that signify than a 
mere rhetorical climax? 

Mere generalization is one-sided and leads to fan- 
tastical dreams. By this method one can transform 
anything into everything. It is necessary to supple- 
ment generalization by specialization. We wish to 
have the elephants separated from the fleas, the mice 
from the lice, at the same time never forgetting the 
unity of the special and the general. This sin of omis- 
sion has often been committed by the zoologists in the 
museums and the botanists in their plant collections, 
and philosophical investigators of the soul like Fech- 
ner have drifted into the other extreme of generaliza- 
tion without specialization. 

The positive outcome of philosophy, then, in its 
abstract outline, is at present the doctrine that the 
general must be conceived in its relation to its special 
forms, and these forms in their universal interconnec- 
tion, in their qualities as parts of nature in general. 
True, such an abstract outline reveals very little. In 
order to grasp its concrete significance, we must pene- 
trate into its details, into the special aspects of this 
doctrine. 

The title of "Critique of Reason," which Kant gave 
to his special study, is at the same time a fitting term 
for all philosophical research. Reason, the essential 
part of the human soul, raises the critique of reason, 



358 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF 1'IIILOSOPHY 

the science of philosophy, to the position of the most 
essential part of psychology. 

But why do we call this the most essential part? 
Is not the material world and its understanding as 
essential as reason, as intellect, which bends to the 
task of exploring this world? Surely, it is, and I do 
not use the word essential in this sense. I call the in- 
tellect the most essential part of the soul, and the soul 
the most essential part of the world, only in so far as 
these parts are the special condition of all scientific 
study and because the investigation of the general 
nature of scientific study is my special object and pur- 
pose. Whether I endeavor to explain the general 
nature of scientific study, whether I investigate the in- 
tellect or the theory of understanding, it all amounts 
to the same thing. 

Let us approach our task once more from the side 
of Fechner's universal soul. With his extravagant 
animation of all things, with his plant, stone, and star 
souls, he can help us to prove that the general nature 
of that particle of soul which is called reason, intellect, 
spirit, or understanding, is not so extraordinarily dif- 
ferent from the general nature of stones or trees as the 
old time idealists and materialists were wont to think. 

As I said before, Fechner is a poet, and a poet sees 
similarities which a matter-of-fact brain cannot per- 
ceive. But at the same time we must admit that the 
matter of fact brain which cannot see anything but 
mere distinctions is a very poor brain. The philoso- 
phers before me have taught me that a good brain sees 
the similarities and the differences at the same time 
and knows how to discriminate between them. A 
sober poetry and the combination of poetic qualities 



THE UNDERSTANDING OF THE SOUL 359 

with a comprehensive and universal levelheadedness 
and discrimination, these are the marks of a good 
head. Still the poorest as well as the most talented 
brains partake of the general brain nature, which con- 
sists in the understanding that like and unlike, general 
and special, are interrelated. The one is never without 
the other, but both are always together. 

If the distinction between men and stones is so 
trifling that a talented brain like Fechner's can justly 
speak of them both as being animated, surely the dif- 
ference between the body and soul cannot be so great 
that there is not the least similarity and community 
between them. However, this escaped Fechner's 
notice. Is not the air or the scent of flowers an ethe- 
real body? 

Reason is also called understanding, and it is a 
positive achievement of philosophy to have arrived at 
the knowledge that this understanding does not admit 
of any exaggerated distinctions. In other words, all 
things are so closely related that a good poet may 
transform anything into everything. Can natural 
science do as much? Ah, the gentlemen of that 
science are also progressing well. They transform dry 
substance into liquid, and liquid into gas ; they change 
gravity into heat and heat into mechanical power. 
And they are doing this without forgetting to discrim- 
inate, as happened to our Fechner. 

It is not enough to know that the body has a soul 
and the soul a body, not enough to know that every- 
thing has a soul. It is also necessary to discriminate 
between the peculiarities and details of the human, 
animal, plant, and other souls, taking care not to ex- 



360 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

aggerate their differences to the extreme of making 
them senseless. 

We do not intend to follow this theory of a univer- 
sal soul any further. Fechner declares himself that "it 
must be admitted at the outset that the whole question 
of a soul is a question of faith." . . t "Analogy is 
not a convincing proof." . . . "We can no more 
prove the existence of a soul than we can disprove it." 

However, from the time of Cartesius it has been an 
accepted fact in the world of philosophers that the con- 
sciousness of the human soul is the best proof of its 
existence. The most positive science in the world is 
the empirical self-observation of the thinking soul. 
This subject is the most conspicuous object imagin- 
able, and it is the positive outcome of philosophy to 
have given an excellent description of the life and 
actions of this soul particle called consciousness or 
understanding. 

If the understanding is a part of the human soul 
and this soul an evident and positive part of the uni- 
versal life, then, clearly, everything partaking of this 
life, such as pieces of wood and stones scattered 
around, is related to this soul. Individual human 
souls, national souls, animal souls, pieces of wood, 
lumps of stone, world bodies, are all children of the 
same common universal nature. But there are so 
many children that they must be classified into orders, 
classes, families, etc., in order to know them apart. 
On account of their likeness, the souls belong together 
in one class and the bodies in another, and each re- 
quires more detailed classification. Thus we finally 
arrive at the class of human souls forming a depart- 



THE UNDERSTANDING OF THE SOUL 361 

ment by themselves, because they all have a common 
general character. 

The manufacturers know that the work of ten 
laborers produces more and is of a different quality 
than the work of a single laborer multiplied by ten. 
Likewise the general human soul, or any national soul, 
expresses itself differently from the sum of the various 
individual souls composing it. More even, the very 
individual soul differs at various times and places, so 
that the individual soul is as manifold as any national 
soul. 

"Has the plant a soul? Has the earth a soul? 
Have they a soul analogous to that of man? That is 
the question." Thus asks Fechner. 

Just as my soul of today has something analogous 
to my soul of yesterday, so it has also with the soul of 
my brother, and finally with the souls of animals, 
plants, stones, etc., proving that everything is more or 
less analogous. A herd of sheep is analogous to 
yonder flock of small, white clouds in the sky, and a 
poet has the license to call those small clouds little 
sheep. In the same way Fechner is justified in pro- 
pounding his theory of- a universal soul. 

Is it not necessary, however, to make a distinction 
between poetry and truth? My brother's soul and my 
own are souls in the true sense of the word, but the 
souls of stones — they are only so figuratively speaking. 

At this point I want to call the reader's attention to 
the fact that we must not pass lightly over the valua- 
tion of the difference between the true and the figura- 
tive sense of a word. 

Words are names which do not, and cannot, have 
any other function than that of symbolic illustration. 



362 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

My soul, yours, or any other, are only in conception 
the same souls. 

When I say that John Flathead has the same soul 
as you and I, my intention is simply to indicate that he 
has something which is common to you and me and to 
all men. His soul is made in the image of our souls. 
But where shall we draw the line in this comparison of 
images? What is not an image in the abstract, and 
what is more than an image in the concrete? 

Truth and fiction are not totally different. The 
poet speaks the truth and true understanding partakes 
largely of the nature of poetry. 

Philosophy has truly perceived the nature of the 
soul, and especially that part of it with which we are 
dealing, that is, reason or understanding. This in- 
strument has the function of furnishing to our head a 
picture of the processes of the world outside of it, to 
describe everything that is around us and to analyze 
the universe, itself a phenomenon, with all its phe- 
nomena as a process of infinite variety in time and 
space. 

If this could be accomplished with the theory of a 
universal soul, then Fechner would be the greatest 
philosopher that ever was. But he lacks the under- 
standing that the intellect which has to combine all 
things within a general wrapper, must also consider 
the other side of the question, that of specification. 
That, of course, cannot be achieved by any philoso- 
pher. It must be the work of all science, and philos- 
ophy as a doctrine of science must acknowledge that. 



THE FACULTIES OF CONSCIOUSNESS 363 

VI 

CONSCIOUSNESS IS ENDOWED WITH THE FACULTY OF 
KNOWING AS WELL AS WITH THE -FEELING OF THE 
UNIVERSALITY OF ALL NATURE 

In the historical course of philosophy, there has 
been much discussion as to where our knowledge 
comes from, whether any of it, or how much of it, is 
innate, and how much acquired by experience. With- 
out any innate faculties no knowledge could have been 
gathered with any "amount of experience, and without 
any experience even the best faculties would remain 
barren. The results of science in all departments are 
due to the interaction of subject and object. 

There could be no subjective faculty of vision un- 
less there were something objective to be seen. The 
possession of a faculty of vision carries with it the 
practical performance of seeing. One cannot have the 
faculty of vision without seeing things. Of course, the 
two may be separated, but only in theory, not in prac- 
tice, and this theoretical separation must be accom- 
panied by the recollection that the separated faculty is 
only a conception derived from the practical function. 
Faculty and function are combined and belong 
together. 

Man does not acquire consciousness, the faculty of 
understanding, until he knows something, and his 
power grows with the performance of this function. 

The reader will remember that we have mentioned 
as an achievement of philosophy the understanding of 
the fact that we must not make any exaggerated dis- 
tinctions. Hence we must not make any such distinc- 



364 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

tion between the innate faculty of understanding and 
the acquired knowledge. 

It is an established universal rule that the human 
intellect knows of no absolute separation of any two 
things, although it is free to separate the universe into 
its parts for the purpose of understanding. 

Xow. if 1 claim that the conception of the universe 
is innate in us, the reader must not conclude that I be- 
lieve in the old prejudice of the human intellect being 
like a receptacle filled with ideas of the true, the beau- 
tiful, the good, and so forth. Xo, the intellect can cre- 
ate its ideas and concepts only by self-production and 
the world around it must furnish the materials for this 
purpose. But such a production presupposes an innate 
faculty. Consciousness, the knowledge of being, must 
be present, before any special knowledge can be 
acquired. Consciousness signifies the knowledge of 
being. It means having at least a faint inkling of the 
fact that being is The universal idea. Being is every- 
thing; it is the essence of everything. Without it 
there cannot be anything, because it is the universe, 
the infinite. 

Consciousness is in itself the consciousness of the 
infinite. The innate consciousness of man is the 
knowledge of infinite existence. When I know that I 
exist, then I know myself as a part of existence. That 
this existence, this world, of which I am but a particle 
with all others, must be an infinite world, does indeed 
not dawn on me until I begin to analyze the concep- 
tion of being with an experienced instrument of 
thought. The reader, in undertaking this work with 
such an instrument, will at once discover that the 
conception of the infinite is innate to his conscious- 



THE FACULTIES OF CONSCIOUSNESS" 305 

ness,* and that no faculty of conception is possible 
without this conception. The faculty of conception, 
understanding, thought, means above all the faculty of 
grasping the universal concept. The intellect cannot 
have any conception which is not more or less clearly 
or faintly based on the concept of the universe. 
Cogito, ergo sum. I think, therefore, I am. Whatever 
I imagine is there, at least in imagination. Of course, 
the imagined and the real thing are different, yet this 
difference does not exceed the limits of the universal 
existence. Creatures of fiction and real creatures are 
not so radically different that they would not all of 
them fit into the general gender of being. The man- 
ner, the form of being, are different. Goblins exist in 
fiction and Polish Jews exist in a tangible form, but 
they both exist. The general existence comprises the 
body and the soul, fiction and truth, goblins and Polish 
Jews. 

It is no more inconceivable that the faculty of uni- 
versal understanding should be innate in us than that- 
circles come into this world round, two mountains 
have a valley between them, water is liquid and fire 
burns. All things have a certain composition in them- 
selves, they are born with it. Does that require any 
explanation? The flowers which gradually grow on 
plants, the powers and wisdom that grow in men in 
the course of years, are no more easily explained than 
such innate faculties, and the latter are no more won- 
derful than those acquired later. The best explanation 
cannot deprive the wonders of nature of their natural 
marvelousness. It is a mistake to assume that the 



g., given with his consciousness. — Editor. 



366 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

faculty of explanation which is located in the human 
brain, is a destroyer of the belief in natural marvels. 
Philosophy which makes this faculty of explanation 
and the nature of its explanations the object of its spe- 
cial study gives us a new and much better understand- 
ing of this old miracle maker. It destroys the belief 
in metaphysical miracles by showing that physical 
nature is so universal that it absolutely excludes every 
other form of existence than the natural one from this 
world of wonders. 

I and many of my readers find in our brains the 
actual consciousness that this general nature of which 
the intellect is a part is an infinite nature. I call this 
consciousness innate, although it is acquired. The 
point that I wish to impress on the reader is that the 
difference generally made between innate and acquired 
qualities is not so extraordinary that the innate need 
not to be acquired and the acquired does not presup- 
pose something innate. The one contradicts the other 
only in those brains who do not understand the posi- 
tive outcome of philosophy. Such thinkers do not 
know how to make reasonable distinctions and exag- 
gerate in consequence. They have not grasped the 
conciliation of all differences and contradictions in uni- 
versal nature by which all contradictions are solved. 

Philosophy has endeavored to understand the in- 
tellect. In demonstrating the positive outcome of phil- 
osophy, we must explain that philosophical under- 
standing as well as any other does not rise out of the 
isolated faculty of understanding, but out of the uni- 
versal nature. The womb of our knowledge and 
understanding must not be sought in the human brain, 
but in all nature which is not only called the universe, 



THE FACULTIES OF CONSCIOUSNESS 3G7 

but is actually universal. In order to prove this latter 
assertion, I refer to the fact that this conception, this 
consciousness of the infinite in the developed intellect, 
is in a manner innate. If the reader wishes to object 
to my indiscriminately mixing the innate faculty with 
the acquired understanding, I beg him to consider that 
I am endeavoring to prove that any and all distinction 
made by the intellect refers in reality to the insepar- 
able parts of the one undivided universe. From this it 
follows that the admired and mysterious intellect is 
not a miracle, or at least no greater marvel than any 
other part of the general marvel which is identical 
with the infinitely wonderful general nature. 

Some people love to represent consciousness as 
something supernatural, to draw an unduly sharp line 
of separation between thinking and being, thought and 
reality. But philosophy, which occupies itself particu- 
larly with consciousness, has ascertained that such a 
sharp contrast is unwarranted, not in harmony with 
the reality, and not a faithful likeness of reality and 
truth. 

In order to understand what philosophy has accom- 
plished in the way of insight into the function of the 
discriminating intellect, we must never lose sight of 
the fact that there is only a moderate distinction of 
degree between purely imaginary things and socalled 
real things. 

Neither the natural condition of our faculty of 
thought, nor the universality of general nature, permit 
of an exaggerated distinction between the reality of 
creations of imagination and of really tangible things. 
At the same time the exigencies of science demand 
clear illustrations and so we must distinguish between 



368 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

these two kinds of reality. It is true that in common 
usage the mere thought and the purely imaginary 
things are set apart from nature and reality as some- 
thing different and antagonistic. Yet the rules of lan- 
guage heretofore in vogue cannot prevent the spread 
of the additional knowledge that the universe, or gen- 
eral nature, is so unlimited that it can establish a con- 
ciliation between these limited antagonisms. The cat 
and the dog, for instance, are pronounced enemies, but 
nevertheless zoology recognizes them as being legiti- 
mate domestic companions. 

Human consciousness is. in the first place, indi- 
vidual. Every human individual has its own. But 
the peculiarity of my consciousness, of yours, and that 
of others, is that of being not alone the consciousness 
of the individual in question, but also the general con- 
sciousness of the universe, at least that is its possibility 
and mission. Xot every individual is conscious of the 
universality of general nature, otherwise there would 
be none of that distracting dualism. Nor would there 
be any necessity for volumes and volumes of philos- 
ophy to teach us that a limit, a thing, or a world out- 
side of the universal, is a nonsensical idea, an idea 
which is contrary to sense and reason. We may well 
say, for this reason, that our consciousness, our intel- 
lect, is only in a manner of speaking our own, while it 
is in fact a consciousness, an intellect belonging to 
universal nature. 

It can no more be denied that our consciousness is 
an attribute of the infinite universe than it can be 
denied that the sun, the moon and the stars are. Since 
this intellectual faculty belongs to the infinite and is 
its child, we must not wonder that this universal 



SPIRIT AND NATURE 369 

faculty of thought is born with the capability of grasp- 
ing the conception of a universe And whoever does 
no longer wonder at this, must find it explicable, must 
realize that the fact of universal consciousness is thus 
explained. 

To explain the mysterious may be regarded as the 
whole function of understanding, of intellect. If we 
succeed in divesting of its mysteries the fact that the 
concept of an infinite universe is found in the limited 
human mind, we have then explained this fact itself 
and substantiated our contention that the things 
around us are explained by their accurate reflection in 
our brain. 

We summarize the nature of consciousness, its 
actions, life, and aims in these words : It is the science 
of infinite being; it seeks to obtain an accurate con- 
ception of this being and to explain its marvelousness. 
But we have by no means exhausted its life and aims 
in these words. With all the power of language, we 
can convey but a vague idea of the immensity of the 
object under discussion. Whoever desires to know 
more about it, must work for his own progress by 
observation and study. This much may be safely 
said : This question is no more mysterious than any 
other part of the general mystery. 



VII 

THE RELATIONSHIP OR IDENTITY OF SPIRIT AND NATURE 

"There is a natural law of analogy which explains 
that all things belonging to the universe are members 
of the same family, that they are related to one another 



370 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

by bonds which permit of the greatest variety in indi- 
vidual differences and are not nullified even by the dis- 
tance between extremes." If we grasp the meaning 
of these words in their full bearing, we recognize the 
outcome of philosophy up to date. They teach us how 
to use our intellect in order to obtain an accurate pic- 
ture of the universe. 

The intellect is also called by the name of faculty 
of discrimination. If in the science of the powers of 
this faculty we place ourselves on the standpoint of 
present-day natural knowledge, we possess the clear 
and plain insight that there are no exaggerated distinc- 
tions, no unrelated extremes, in the universe. The in- 
finite is related to the finite. For all developed and 
perishable things are the direct offspring of the imper- 
ishable, of the eternal universe. General nature and 
its special parts are inseparably interlaced. There is 
nothing among all that has a name which is funda- 
mentally different from other things known by name. 

There will hardly be any objection against these 
sentences, until we proceed to draw their last conse- 
quences. If alb things are related and without excep- 
tion children of the universe, it follows that mind and 
matter must also be two yards of cloth from the same 
piece. Hence the difference between human under- 
standing and other natural human faculties must not 
be magnified into that of irreconcilable extremes. 

In order to become accustomed to scientific dis- 
tinctions, the reader should consider that a man can 
remain under the sway of a belief in ghosts only so 
long as he ignores the relationship of all existing 
things. He believes in real ghosts whose reality is 
supposed to be radically different from his own. SucH 



SPIRIT AND NATURE 371 

a distinction is exaggerated and illogical, and whoever 
believes in it does not know how to discriminate scien- 
tifically and has not the full use of his critical faculties. 

Just as common parlance opposes art to nature and 
then forgets that art is a part of nature, similarly as 
night is a part of day, so the language of the believer 
in ghosts does not know that reason and wood, mind 
and matter, in spite of all their differences, are two 
parts of the same whole, two expressions of the same 
universal reality. Everything is real and true, because 
in the last instance the universe is all, is the only truth 
and reality. So I call it a slip of the tongue to speak 
of natural nature as opposed to natural art or artificial 
nature, of imaginary reality as distinct from real real- 
ity. There ought to be a different name for the day 
of twelve hours than for the day of twenty-four hours, 
so that it might be better understood that day and 
night are not fundamentally different, but two prongs 
of the same fork. 

Just as the faculty of thinking is innate in the child, 
and grows with its development, so mankind's faculty 
of thought grows and has hitherto expressed itself in 
a language which gave only instinctive conceptions of 
the composition of the human brain and of its func- 
tions. The construction of languages explains in a 
way the condition of the human mind which had only 
inadequate knowledge of itself so far. Those short- 
comings of speech which I called slips of the tongue 
were not understood until sufficient progress had been 
made in the explanation of the process of thinking, and 
now these same shortcomings offer an excellent means 
of representing and demonstrating the results of en- 
lightenment. 



372 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

The mind is to give to man a picture of the world, 
the language is the brush of the mind. It paints by 
its construction the universal relationship of all things 
referred to in the beginning of this chapter, and it does 
so in the following manner : It gives to each thing not 
only its own name, but also adds to it another indicat- 
ing its family, and another indicating its race, another 
for the species, the genus, and finally a general name 
which proclaims that all things are parts of the. one 
indivisible unit which is called world, existence, uni- 
verse, cosmos. 

This diagrammatic construction of language fur- 
nishes us with an illustration of the graduated rela- 
tionship of things and of the way in which the human 
race arrives at its knowledge, its perceptions or oic- 
tures. 

We said that philosophy is that endeavor which 
seeks to throw light on the process of human thought. 
This work has been rendered very difficult by the un- 
avoidable misunderstanding of the universal relation- 
ship just mentioned. The transcendentalists insist 
above all that the process of thinking and its product, 
thought, should not be classed among ordinary 
physics, not as a part of physical nature, but as the 
creature of another nature which carries the mysteri- 
ous name of metaphysics. That such a nature and 
such a science is neither possible nor real is proven by 
the construction of language which normally describes 
everything as being closely related and corroborates 
this by its abnormal shortcomings which we called 
slips of the tongue. 

The shortcomings of language which demonstrate 
the positive outcome of philosophy consist in occasion- 



SPIRIT AND NATURE 373 

ally giving insufficiently significant names to things 
belonging to a group in which the distinction between 
individuals, species, genera, and families is not clearly 
defined. It is not discernible, for instance, whether 
the term "cat" applies to a domestic cat or to a tiger, 
because that term is used for a large class of animals 
of which the domestic cat is the arch-type. 

But it may be that this illustration is not well 
chosen for the purpose of demonstrating that slip of 
the tongue which is supposed to give us an exact ap- 
preciation of the positive outcome of philosophy. Let 
us find another and better illustration which will be a 
transition from the inadequate to the adequate and 
thus throw so much more light on the obscurities of 
language. 

Another and better example of the inadequacies of 
language is the distinction between fish and meat. In 
this case, we entirely lack a general term for meat, 
one kind of which is furnished by aquatic animals and 
the other by terrestrial animals. 

Now let the reader apply this shortcoming of lan- 
guage to the distinction between physics and meta- 
physics, or between thought and reality. We lack a 
term which will fully indicate the relation between 
these two. Thoughts are indeed real things. True, 
there is a difference whether I have one hundred dol- 
lars in imagination or in reality in my pocket. Still we 
must not exaggerate this difference into something 
transcendental. Painted money or imagined money 
are in a way also real, that is in imagination. In other 
words, language lacks a term which will clearly ex- 
press the different realities within the compass of the 
unit. 



3'A THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

The understanding- of these peculiarities of lan- 
guage is calculated to promote the insight and enlight- 
enment in regard to that secret lamp which man is 
carrying in his brain and with which he lights up the 
things of this world. The cultivation of the theory of 
understanding, the critique of reason, has an elemen- 
tary significance for the elucidation of all things. This 
is not saying that philosophy, that special science with 
which we are here dealing, is a universal science in the 
sense in which antiquity conceived of it. But it is 
universal nevertheless in the sense in which the alpha- 
bet and other primary topics are universal. Every 
one must use his brains and should therefore take 
pains to understand its processes. Though the knowl- 
edge of these does not make other efforts unnecessary, 
still it explains many ideas, it elucidates the nature of 
thinking which every one is doing and which is fre- 
quently used in a more ruthless manner than a dog 
would treat a rag. 

The inertia which has prevented the one-sided 
idealists on the one hand and the one-sided material- 
ists on the other from coming to a peaceful under- 
standing may be traced to one of those slips of the 
tongue. We lack the right terms for designating the 
relationship between spiritual phenomena, such as our 
ideas, conceptions, judgments and conclusions and 
many other things on one side and the tangible, pon- 
derable, commensurable things on the other. True, 
the reason for this lack of terms is the absence of un- 
derstanding, and for this reason the dispute is not one 
of mere words, although it can be allayed only by an 
improvement of our terminology. 

Buchner, in his well-known work on "Force and 



SPIRIT AND NATURE 375 

Matter," likewise overlooks this point, the same as all 
prior materialists, because they are as onesidedly in- 
sistent on their matter as the idealist are on their idea. 
Quarrel and strife mean confusion, only peace will 
bring light. The contrast between matter and mind 
finds its conciliation in the positive outcome of phil- 
osophy which teaches that all distinctions must be 
reasonable, because neither our instrument of thought 
nor the rest of nature justify any exaggerated distinc- 
tions. In order to elucidate the moot question, noth- 
ing is required but the insight that ideas which nature 
develops in the human brain are materials for the work 
of our understanding, though not materials for the work 
of our hands. Philosophy has made material efforts to 
grasp the understanding and its conceptions and is still 
making them in the same way in which chemistry is work- 
ing for the understanding of substances and physics for 
the understanding of forces. 

Substances, forces, ideas, conceptions, judgments, 
conclusions, knowledge and perceptions, according to 
the positive outcome of philosophy, must be regarded 
as differences or varieties of the same monistic genus. 
The differentiation of things no more contradicts their 
unity than their unity contradicts their differentiation. 
Darwin expanded the conception of "species" and thus 
contributed to a better understanding of zoology. 
Philosophy expands the conception of species still far 
beyond the Darwinian definition in teaching us to con- 
sider the species as little generalities and the largest 
genus, the absolute or the cosmos as the all in one, the 
all-embracing species. 

In order to closely connect the worm and the ele- 
phant, the lowest and the highest animal, the vegetable 



376 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

and the animal kingdom, the inorganic and the organic, 
as members of the same species or genus in a reason- 
able way, we must keep account of the gradations in 
nature, the transitions, the connecting links and con- 
necting ideas. Embryology, which shows that the 
life of the highest animal develops through the stages 
of the animal genus, has greatly promoted the under- 
standing of the common nature of all animals. 

"The continuity in the natural gradation of things 
is perfect, because there are no gradations which are 
not represented, because there are no differences be- 
tween the various grades which nature does not fill by 
an intermediary form. . . . There is no abrupt dif- 
ference in nature, no metaphysical jump, no vacuum, 
no gap in the order of the world," says a well-known 
author of our times whose name I shall not mention, 
because T wish to base my argument on the acknowl- 
edged facts rather than on names of authorities. 

What Darwin taught us in relation to animal life, 
viz., that there are no fundamental differences between 
species, that is taught by philosophy in regard to the 
universe. The understanding of the latter is rendered 
difficult by the habit of making a transcendental dis- 
tinction between matter and mind. 



VIII 

UNDERSTANDING IS MATERIAL 

Whether we say that philosophy has the under- 
standing for the object of its study, or whether we 



UNDERSTANDING IS MATERIAL 377 

say that philosophy investigates the method of utiliz- 
ing subjective understanding in order to arrive at gen- 
uine, correct, excellent, objective knowledge, that is 
only a matter of using different terms for the same 
process. It makes no difference whether we designate 
the object of our special science as a thing or as a 
process. It is much more essential to understand that 
the distinction between the thing and its action is in 
this instance of little consequence. 

According to modern natural science all existence 
is resolved into motion. It is well known now that 
even rocks do not stand still, but are continuously 
active, growing and decaying. 

The understanding, the intellect, is an active object, 
or an objective action, the same as sunshine, the flow of 
waters, growing of trees, disintegration of rocks, or 
any other natural phenomenon. Also the understand- 
ing, the thinking which takes place consciously or un- 
consciously in the human brain, is a phenomenon of as 
indubitable actuality as the most material of them. It 
cannot in the least shake our contention of the mate- 
rially perceptible nature of intellectual activity that we 
become aware of this activity by an internal, not by an 
external, sense. Whether a stone is externally per- 
ceptible or thought internally, what difference does 
this slight distinction make in the incontestable fact 
that both perceptions are of equal material, natural 
and sense-perceptible kind? Why should not the 
action of the brain belong in the same category as the 
action of the heart? And though the movement of 
the heart be internal and that of the tongue of the 
nightingale external, what is to prevent us from con- 
sidering these two movements from the higher view- 



378 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

point of natural or material processes? If the func- 
tion of the heart may be referred to as material, why 
not the function of the brain? True, the present 
usages of language are in conflict with this mode of 
thought. But it must be remembered that every 
science comes into conflict with usages of language by 
progressive development. The discovery of every new 
thing in plant and animal life compels the discoverer 
to invent a new term or change the meaning of an old 
one. The term material has not had a well defined, but 
rather an indefinite meaning so far. Now, since it is 
necessary, in order to understand the function of the 
brain to remove it from the class of transcendental or 
metaphysical conceptions and assign to it a place 
among the material things, the question arises : What 
will be the most appropriate term for it? The mate- 
rial and the spiritual are both two species of the same 
genus. How are we to designate the species, how the 
genus ? For the sake of complete clearness, we require 
three different names, one for each species and a com- 
mon general name. But since we are much less con- 
cerned about the name than about the understanding 
of these facts which cannot be well explained without 
terms, we do not insist dogmatically on calling the 
understanding material. It is sufficient to point out 
that the function of the heart and of the brain both 
belong to the same class, no matter whether this class 
be called material, real, physical, or what not. So 
long as language has not established a definite mean- 
ing for these terms, all of them serve equally well and 
are equally deceptive. 

The positive outcome of philosophy which cul- 
minates in placing the theory of understanding in the 



UNDERSTANDING IS MATERIAL 379 

same class with all other theories, cannot be easily 
demonstrated on account of a natural confusion of 
thought which arises from an equally natural confu- 
sion of language. In the special department of handi- 
craft as well as in that of scientific brain work the 
terminology is well systematized, while in the general 
affairs of life and science there is a confusion which is 
as great in the matter of conceptions as in that of 
applying the terms by which those awkward concep- 
tions are expressed. 

Wherever understanding is clear, there the lan- 
guage is also clear. The man who does not under- 
stand shoemaking does not understand its termin- 
ology. This is not saying that the understanding of 
a trade and the understanding of its terminology are 
identical, but only indicating their actual connection. 

If the reader has had a glimpse of the enormity of 
the work of more than two thousand years of philos- 
ophy in order to state what little we know today of 
its achievement in the science of understanding, he 
will not be very much surprised at the difficulties we 
here meet with in finding terms for its demonstration. 

The function of the brain is as material as that of 
the heart. The heart and its function are two things, 
but they are dependent one upon the other so that one 
cannot exist without the other. The function may 
partly be felt. We feel the heart beating, the brain 
working. The working of the heart may even be felt 
by touch, which is not the case with the working of the 
brain. But it would be a mistake to imagine that our 
knowledge of the function of the heart is exhausted by 
our perception of it through the touch. Once we have 
overcome the habit of making exaggerated distinctions 



3S0 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

between things, and have learned to consider the dif- 
ferences of things as well as their interconnection, we 
can easily understand that the science of the function 
of the heart is an infinite science which is connected 
with all others. The heart cannot work without the 
blood, the blood cannot exist without food, and this 
is connected with the air, the plants, the animals, the 
sun, and the moon. 

The function of the brain and its product, the 
understanding, is likewise inseparable from the uni- 
versal interdependence of things. The health of the 
blood which is produced by the action of the heart is 
no more and no less a material phenomenon than the 
total knowledge of science which appears as a product 
of brain life. 

Although we represent the doctrine of the material 
nature of understanding as the positive outcome of 
philosophy, this is not proclaiming the victory of that 
narrow materialism which has been spreading itself 
particularly since the eighteenth century. On the con- 
trary, this mechanical materialism wholly misunder- 
stands the nature of the problem. It teaches that the 
faculty of thought is a function of the brain, the brain 
is the object of study and its function, the faculty of 
thought, is fully explained as a brain quality or func- 
tion. This materialism is enamored of mechanics, 
idolizes it, does not regard it as a part of the world, but 
as the sole substance which comprises the whole uni- 
verse. Because it misunderstands the relation of thing 
and function, of subject and predicate, it has no ink- 
ling of the fact that this relation which it handles in 
such a matter-of-fact way, but not at all scientifically, 
may be an object worthy of study. The materialist of 



THE FOUR PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC 381 

the old school is too horny-handed to consider the 
function or quality of understanding as an object 
worthy of a separate scientific department. We, on 
the other hand, follow the suggestion of Spinoza, who 
required of the philosophers that they should consider 
everything in the light of eternity. In so doing we find 
that the tangible things, such as the brain, are qualities 
of nature, and that in the same way the socalled func- 
tions are natural things, substantial parts of the uni- 
verse. 

Not only tangible objects are "things," but also the 
rays of the sun and the scent of flowers belong to this 
category, and perceptions are no exception to the rule. 
But all these "things" are only relative things, since 
they are qualities of the one and absolute which is 
the only thing, the "thing itself," well known to every 
one by the name of the universe, or cosmos. 



IX 

THE FOUR PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC 

Since this work wishes to demonstrate the positive 
outcome of philosophy, the reader may ask the author 
what are his proofs that instead of the quintessence of 
thousands of 3^ears of philosophical work he is not 
offered the elaboration of any individual philosopher, 
or even that of the author himself. 

In reply I wish to say that my work would be ren- 
dered uselessly voluminous by quotations from the 
works of the most prominent philosophical writers, 



THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PIIILOSOPII"X 

without proving" anything-, since the words of one often 
contradict those of another. 

What is said by Kant, Fichtc, Schelling, or Hegel, 
in one place of any of their works, is at least consider- 
ably modified, if not contradicted, in another place of 
the same work. It is of little consequence, how and 
by whose help I have arrived at the positive outcome of 
philosophy as here rendered. Whether it is the actual 
outcome or not can be judged only by the expert, and 
every opinion is necessarily very subjective. 

Under the circumstances T, as author, claim that 
my opinion is worth as much as any other, and the 
reader may therefore accept my assurance. As to the 
further value of that which I offer, it is a peculiarity 
of the subject under discussion that every reader car- 
ries it and its experiences within himself and may, 
without consulting any other author, at once draw his 
own conclusions about my views, provided he has 
acquired the necessary training in thought. What a 
traveler tells us about the interior of Africa must either 
be believed to the letter or verified by the accounts of 
other travelers. But what I say about logic will, I 
hope, find its corroboration in the logic of every read- 
ing brain. 

The theory of understanding which has become the 
special object of philosophy, is nothing else, and can- 
not be anything else, but expanded logic. Many prac- 
tical rules and laws of this department are known and 
recognized since the time of Aristotle. But the ques- 
tion whether there is one world or two, a natural and 
unnatural, or supernatural as it is called with prefer- 
ence, that is the point which has given much trouble to 



THE FOUR PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC 8 S3 

philosophy and which will influence the health of logic 
so long as it is undecided. 

Dr. Friedrich Dittes, director of the institute of 
pedagogy in Vienna, has published a School of Peda- 
gogy, several editions of which have appeared, in 
which he gives much attention to logic. Dittes is a 
prominent pedagogue, well known through his writ- 
ings. He confines himself in his School to teaching 
only that which is well established and accepted with- 
out a doubt. As a practical man who addresses him- 
self mainly to teachers of primary grades, he would 
not place himself on the pinnacle of the outcome of 
philosophy, even if he could. He must confine himself 
to that which is well established, which is far removed 
from the disputes of the day. But it may here serve 
as a whetstone by the help of which we may give to 
the positive product of philosophy its latest and great- 
est sharpness. 

He writes right in the beginning of the first part: 
"Our ideas are as manifold as the objects to which they 
refer. Several things may have many or few, or at 
least one quality, in common. Still they may also be 
totally different." 

This last point, viz., that there may be things which 
are "totally" different from one another, is the one 
which is decidedly rejected by that science which has 
risen to the eminence of the positive acquisition of 
philosophy. There can be no natural things which are 
"totally" different from one another, because they 
must all of them have in common the quality of being 
natural. 

It sounds very commonplace to say that there are 
no unnatural things in nature. Since the last witch 



384 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OP PHILOSOPHY 

was burnt, everybody is sufficiently enlighten* 
know that. But the logical conclusions of natural 
monism have not yet been drawn. True, natural 
science, properly socalled. is busily engaged in arriving 
at them. But so much more strife is there in the 
"science of mind," and there is no other remedy but a 
well founded theory of understanding which teaches 
that nature is not alone absolute nature, but also the 
nature of the absolute. From this doctrine it neces- 
sarily follows that all things are not individually inde- 
pendent, but related by sex, dependent children, "predi- 
cates" of the monistic unity of the world. 

"The arch fountain of the human spirit," says 
Dittes, "is perception. . . . Whether perception 
as such discloses to us the true nature of things, or 
whether it makes us familiar only with their phe- 
nomena, this is not to be discussed by logic." The 
practical pedagogue who confines himself to the edu- 
cation of children's brains or who wishes at most to 
influence such teachers as educate children's brains, is 
quite right in being satisfied with the old traditional 
Aristotlean logic. But in the school of the human 
race, this logic has not been sufficient. For this reason 
the philosophers have broached the question whether 
perception, "the arch fountain of the human spirit," is 
a true or a deceptive fountain. The product of the 
philosophical investigation which we here offer 
amounts to the declaration that the logicians are 
greatly mistaken about the "arch fountain." It is a 
cardinal error of ancient logic to regard perception as 
the ultimate source from which the human mind dips 
its knowledge. It is nature which is the ultimate 
source, and our perception is but the mediator of un- 






THE FOUR PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC 385 

derstanding. And its product, recognized truth, is not 
truth itself, but merely a formal picture of it. Univer- 
sal nature is the arch fountain, is the eternal and im- 
perishable truth itself, and our perception, like every 
other part of universal existence, is only an attribute, 
a particle of absolute nature. The human mind, with 
whose nature logic is dealing, is no more an independ- 
ent thing than any other, but simply a phenomenon, a 
reflex or predicate of nature. 

To confound true perceptions or perceived truths with 
general truth, with the non plus ultra of all truths, is 
equivalent to regarding a sparrow as the bird in general, 
or a period of civilization as civilization itself, which 
would mean the closing of the door to all further devel- 
opment. 

Modern philosophy, beginning with Bacon of Veru- 
lam and closing with Hegel, carries on a constant strug- 
gle with the Aristotlean logic. The product of this strug- 
gle, the outcome of philosophy, does not deny the old 
rules of traditional logic, but adds a new and decidedly 
higher circle of logical perception to the former ones. 
For the sake of better understanding it may be well to 
give to this circle a special title, the special name of 
"theory of understanding," which is sometimes called 
"dialectics." 

In order to demonstrate the essential contents of 
this philosophical product by an investigation of the 
fundamental laws of traditional logic and to explain it 
thereby, I refer once more to the teacher of elementary 
logic, Dittes. 

Under the caption of "Principles of Judgment" he 
teaches: "Since judging, like all thinking, aims at the 
perception of truth, the rules have been sought after 



386 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME oe philosophy 

by which this purpose might be accomplished. As univer- 
sally applicable rules, as principles or laws of thought, 
the following four have been named: 

(1) The law of uniformity (identity). 

i ".' ) The law of contradiction. 
I The law of the excluded third. 

( 1 ) The law of adequate cause. - ' 

So much scholastic talk has been indulged in over 
these four "principles," that I can hardly bring myself to 
discuss them further. But since my purpose, the demon- 
stration of the positive outcome of philosophy, consists in 
throwing a new light on the logic contained in these four 
so-called principles or laws, I am compelled to lay bare 
their inmost kernel. 

The first principle, then, declares that A is A, or to 
speak mathematically, every quantity is equal to itself. 
In plain English : a thing is what it is ; no thing is what 
it is not. "Characters which are excluded by any con- 
ception must not be attributed to it." The square is ex- 
cluded from the conception of a circle, therefore the pre- 
dicate "square" must not be given to a circle. For the 
same reason a straight line must not be crooked, and a 
lie must not be true. 

Xow this so-called law of thought may be well enough 
for household use, where nothing but known quantities 
are under consideration. A thing is what it is. Right is 
not left and one hundred is not one thousand. Whoever 
is named Peter or Paul remains Peter or Paul all his life. 
This, I say, is all right for household use. 

But when we consider matters from the wider point of 
view of cosmic universal life, then this famous law of 
thought proves to be nothing but an expedient in logic 
which is not adequate to the nature of things, but merely 
a means of mutual understanding for us human beings. 



THE FOUR PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC 387 

Hence the left bank of the Rhine is not the right, because 
we have agreed that in naming the banks of a river we 
will turn our backs to the source and our faces to the 
mouth of the river and then designate the banks as right 
and left. Such a way of distinguishing, thinking, and 
judging is good and practical, so long as this narrow 
standpoint is accompanied by the consciousness of its 
narrowness. Hitherto this has not been the case. This 
determined logic has overlooked that the perception 
which is produced by its rules is not truth, not the real 
world, but only gives an ideal, more or less accurate, re- 
flection of it. Peter and Paul, who according to the law 
of identity are the same all their lives, are in fact dif- 
ferent fellows every minute and every day of their lives, 
and all things of this world are, like those two, not con- 
stant, but very variable quantities. The mathematical 
points, the straight lines, the round circles, are ideals. 
In reality every point has a certain dimension, every 
straight line, when seen through a magnifying glass, is 
full of many crooked turns, and even the roundest circle, 
according to the mathematicians, consists of an infinite 
number of straight lines. 

The traditional logic, then, declares with its law of 
identity, or in the words of Dittes "law of uniformity," 
that Peter and Paul are the same fellows from beginning 
to end, or that the western mountains remain the same 
western mountains so long as they exist. The product of 
modern philosophy, on the other hand, declares that the 
identity of people, woods, and rocks is inseparably linked 
..to their opposite, their incessant transformation. The old 
school logic treats things, the objects of perception, like 
stereotyped moulds, while the philosophically expanded 
logic considers such treatment adequate for household 



388 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

use only. The logical household use of stereotyped con- 
ceptions extends, and should extend, to all of science. The 
consideration of things as remaining "the same" is indis- 
pensable, and yet it is very salubrious to know and re- 
member that the things are not only the same permanent 
and stereotyped, but at the same time variable and in 
flow. That is a contradiction, but not a senseless one. 
This contradiction has confused the minds and given 
much trouble to the philosophers. The solution of this 
problem, the elucidation of this simple fact, is the positive 
product of philosophy. 

I have just declared that logic so far did not know 
that the perception produced by its principles does not 
offer us truth itself, but only a more or less accurate pic- 
ture of it. I have furthermore contended that the posi- 
tive outcome of philosophy has materially added to the 
clearness of the portrait of the human mind. Logic 
claims to be "the doctrine of the forms and laws of 
thought." Dialectics, the product of philosophy, aims to 
be the same, and its first paragraph declares : Not 
thought produces truth, but being, of which thought is 
only that part which is engaged in securing a picture of 
truth. The fact resulting from this statement may easily 
confuse the reader, viz., that the philosophy which has 
been bequeathed to us by logical dialectics, or dialectic 
logic, must explain not alone thought, but also the 
original of which thought is a reflex. 

While, therefore, traditional logic teaches in its first 
law that all things are equal to themselves, the new dialec- 
tics teaches not only that things are equal to themselves 
and identical from start to finish, but also that these 
same things have the contradictory quality of being the 
same and yet widely variable. If it is a law of thought 



THE FOUR PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC 389 

that we gain as accurate as possible a conception of things 
by the help of- thought, it is at the same time a law of 
thought that all things, processes, and proceedings are 
not things but resemble the color of that silk which, al- 
though equal to itself and identical throughout, still plays 
from one color into another. The things of which the 
thinking thing or human intellect is one are so far from 
being one and the same from beginning to end that they 
are in truth and fact without beginning and end. And 
as phenomena of nature, as parts of infinite nature, they 
only seem to have a beginning and end, while they are 
in reality but natural transformations arising temporarily 
from the infinite and returning into it after a while. 

Natural truth or true nature, without beginning and 
end, is so contradictory that it only expresses itself by 
shifting phenomena which are nevertheless quite true. 
To old line logic this contradiction appears senseless. It 
insists on its first, second, and third law, on its identity, 
its law of contradiction and excluded third, which must 
be either straight or crooked, cold or warm, and excludes 
all intermediary conceptions. And in a way it is right. 
For every-day use it is all right to deal in this summary 
fashion with thoughts and words. But it is at the same 
time judicious to learn from the positive outcome of 
philosophy that in reality and truth things do not come 
to pass so ideally. The logical laws think quite cor- 
rectly of thoughts and their forms and applications. But 
they do not exhaust thinking and its thoughts. They 
overlook the consciousness of the inexhaustibleness of all 
natural creations, of which the object of logic, human 
understanding, is a part. This object did not fall from 
heaven, but is a finite part of the infinite which actually 
has the contradictory quality of possessing in and with 



390 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

its logical nature that universal nature which is superior 
to all logic. 

From this critique of the three first "fundamental 
laws of logic" it is apparent that the human understand- 
ing is not only everywhere identical, but also different 
in each individual and has a historical development. We 
arc, of course, logically entitled to consider this faculty 
like all others by itself and give it a birthday. Wherever 
man begins, there understanding, the faculty of thought, 
begins. But we are philosophically and dialectically no 
less entitled, and it is even our duty, to know that the 
faculty of understanding, the same as its human bearer, 
has no beginning, in spite of the fact that we ascribe a 
beginning to them. When we trace the historical devel- 
opment of these two, of man and understanding, back- 
ward to their origin, we arrive at a transition to the 
animal and see their special nature merging into general 
nature. The same is found in tracing the development of 
the individual mind. Where does consciousness begin 
in the child? Before, at, or after birth? Consciousness 
arises from its opposite, unconsciousness, and returns to 
it. In consequence we regard the unconscious as the sub- 
stance and the conscious as its predicate or attribute. And 
the fixed conceptions which we make for ourselves of the 
units or phenomena of the natural substance are recog- 
nized by us as necessary means in explaining nature, but 
at the same time it is necessary to learn from dialectics 
that all fixed conceptions are floating in a liquid element. 
The infinite substance of nature is a very mobile element, 
in which all fixed things appear and sink, thus being tem- 
porarily fixed and yet not fixed. 

Now let us briefly review the fourth fundamental law 
of logic, according to which everything must have an ade- 



THE FOUR PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC 391 

quale cause. This law is likewise very well worthy of 
attention, yet it is very inadequate, because the question 
what should be our conception of the world and what 
is the constitution of the most highly developed thinking 
faculty of the world requires the answer: the world, in 
which everything has its adequate cause, is nevertheless, 
including consciousness and the faculty of thought, 
without beginning, end, and cause, that is, a thing justi- 
fied in itself and by itself. The law of the adequate cause 
applies only to pictures made by the human mind. In our 
logical pictures of the world everything must have its 
adequate cause. But the original, the universal cosmos, 
has no cause, it is its own cause and effect. To understand 
that all causes rest on the causeless is an important dia- 
lectic knowledge which first throws the requisite light 
on the law of the necessity of an adequate cause. 

Formally everything must have its cause. But really 
everything has not only one cause, but innumerable 
causes. Not alone father and mother are the cause of 
my existence, but also the grand parents and great grand 
parents, together with the air they breathed, the food they 
ate, the earth on which they walked, the sun which 
warmed the earth, etc. Not a thing, not a process, not 
a change is the adequate cause of another, but everything 
is rather caused by the universe which is absolute. 

When philosophy began its career with the intention 
of understanding the world, it soon discovered that this 
purpose could be accomplished only by special study. 
When it chose understanding, or the faculty of thought, 
as the special object of its study, it separated its specific 
object too far from the general existence. Its logic, in 
opposing thought to the rest of existence, forgot the in- 
terconnection of the opposites, forgot that thought is a 



392 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

form, a species, an individuality which belongs to the 
genus of existence, the same as fish to the genus of meat, 
night to the genus of day, art to nature, word to action, 
and death to life. It does not attempt to explore the es- 
sence of thought for its own sake, but for the purpose of 
discovering the rules of exploring and thinking correctly. 
It could not very well arrive at those coveted rules, so 
long as it idealized truth transcendcntally and elevated 
it far above the phenomena. All phenomena of nature 
are true parts of truth. Even error and lies are not op- 
posed to truth in that exaggerated sense in which the old 
style logic represents them, which teaches that two con- 
tradictory predicates must not be simultaneously applied 
to the same subject, that any one subject is either true or 
false, and that any third alternative is out of the question. 
Such statements are due to an entire misconception of 
truth. Truth is the absolute, universal sum of all exist- 
ing things, of all phenomena of the past, present, and 
future. Truth is the real universe from which errors and 
lies are not excluded. In so far as stray thoughts, giants 
and brownies, lies and errors are really existing, though 
only in the imagination of men, to that extent they are 
true. They belong to the sum of all phenomena, but 
they are not the whole truth, not the infinite sum. 
And even the most positive knowledge is nothing but an 
excellent picture of a certain part. The pictures in our 
minds have this in common with their originals that they 
are true. All errors and lies are true errors and true lies, 
hence are not so far removed from truth that one should 
belong to heaven and the other to eternal damnation. Let 
us remain human. 

Since old line logic with its four principles was too 
narrowminded, its development had to produce thai dia- 



UNDERSTANDING ON THE RELIGIOUS FIELD 393 

lectics which is the positive outcome of philosophy. This 
science of thought so expanded regards the universe as 
the truly universal or infinite, in which all contradictions 
slumber as in the womb of conciliation. Whether the 
new logic shall have the same name as the old, or assume 
the separate title of theory of understanding or dialectics, 
is simply a question of terms which must be decided by 
considerations of expediency. 



X 



THE FUNCTION OF UNDERSTANDING ON THE RELIGIOUS 
FIELD 

We took our departure from the fact that philosophy 
is searching for "understanding." The first and principal 
acquisition of philosophy was the perception that its object 
is not to be found in a transcendental generality. Who- 
ever wishes to obtain understanding, must confine himself 
to something special, without, however, through this limi- 
tation losing sight of all measure and aim to such an ex- 
tent that he forgets the infinite generality. 

A modern psyschologist who occupies himself with 
"Thoughts on Enlightenment," which topic is evidently 
related to ours, says: "Real and genuine enlightenment 
can proceed only from religious motives." Expressed in 
our language, this would mean: Every genuine under- 
standing, every true conception or knowledge, must be 
based on tie clear consciousness that the infinite universe 
is the arch fundament of all things. 

Understanding and true enlightenment are identical. 



394 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

"It is true," say the "Thoughts on Enlightenment," "that 
all enlightenment takes the form of struggles on account 
of the nature of him who is to be enlightened and of the 
object about which he is to be informed. But it is a strug- 
gle for religion, not against it." The author, Professor 
Lazarus, says in his preface that he does not wish the 
reader to base his opinion on any single detached sen- 
tence. "Every single sentence," he says, "may be tested 
as to its value, but the whole of my views on religion and 
enlightenment cannot be recognized from any single one 
of them." 

As this wish is entirely justified and as our position is 
somewhat supported by his psychological treatment of 
enlightenment, we shall comply with his wish and seek to 
grasp the meaning of his statements on the religious 
nature of enlightenment in their entirety, not as isolated 
sentences. 

We even go a step farther than Professor Lazarus, by 
extending to understanding what he says about enlighten- 
ment, viz., that genuine knowledge and enlightenment 
must, so to say, take their departure from religious mo- 
tives. But we differ a little as to what motives are relig- 
ious. Lazarus refers, so far as I can see, to ideas and 
the ideal, while we, thanks to the positive outcome of 
philosophy, understand the terms religion and religions 
to refer to the universal interdependence of things. 

Obviously the dividing line between heat and cold is 
drawn by the human mind. The point selected for this 
purpose is the freezing point of water. One might just as 
well have selected any other point. Evidently the divid- 
ing line between that which is religious and that which is 
irreligious is as indeterminate as that between hot and 
cold. Neither any university nor any usage of language 



UNDERSTANDING ON THE RELIGIOUS FIELD 395 

can decide that, nor is the pope a scientific authority in the 
matter. 

It is mainly due to the socalled historical school that 
a thing is considered not alone by its present condition, 
but by its origin and decline. What, then, is religion and 
religious ? The fetish cult, the animal cult, the cult of the 
ideal and spiritual creator, or the cult of the real human 
mind ? Where are we to begin and where to end ? If the 
ancient Germans regarded the great oak as sacred and 
religious, why should not art and science become religious 
among the modern Germans? In this sense, Lazarus is 
correct. The "enlightenment" which was headed in 
France by Voltaire and the encyclopedists, in Germany by 
Lessing and Kant, the "enlightenment" which came as a 
struggle for reason and against religion, was then in fact 
a struggle for religion, not against it. By this means 
one may make everything out of anything. But this has 
to be learned first in order to recognize how our mind 
ought to be adjusted, so that it may perceive that not only 
everything is everything, but that each thing also has its 
own place. 

We wish to become clear in our minds how it is possi- 
ble, and reconcilable with sound conception, that such an 
anti-religious struggle as that carried on during that 
period of "enlightenment" can nevertheless be a struggle 
for and in the interest of religion. We wish to find out 
how one may abolish religion and at the same time main- 
tain it. 

This is easily understood, if we remember the repeat- 
edly quoted dialectic rule according to which our under- 
standing must never exaggerate the distinctions between 
two things. We must not too widely separate the relig- 
ious from the secular field. Of course, the religious field 



396 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

is in heaven, while the secular is naturally in the profane 
universe. Having become aware that even religious im- 
agination, together with its heaven and spirit creator, are 
profane conceptions in spite of their alleged transcenden- 
talism, we find religion in the secular field, and thus this 
field has in a way become religious. The religious and 
the profane infinite have something in common, at least 
this that the indefinite religious name may also be ap- 
plied to the secular or profane infinity. 

"All culture, every condition of humanity or of a 
nation, has its roots as well as its bounds in history," says 
our Professor of psychology. Should not religion, which 
according to the words of a German emperor "must be 
preserved for the people," also have its bounds in history? 
Or does it belong to the infinite and must it exist forever? 
In order to free history of its bounds, it is necessary to 
avail ourselves of the positive outcome of philosophy and 
to demonstrate that nothing is infinite but the infinite 
itself, which has the double nature of being infinite and 
inseparable from the finite phenomena of nature. The 
whole of nature is eternal, but none of its individual phe- 
nomena is, although even the imperishable whole is com- 
posed of perishable parts. 

The relation of the constant whole of nature to its 
variable parts, the relation of the general to the specialties 
composing it, includes, if we fully grasp it, a perfect con- 
ception of the human mind as well as of the understand- 
ing and enlightenment which it acquires. This mind can- 
not enlighten itself as to its special nature without observ- 
ing how it came to enlighten itself as to the nature of other 
specialties. We then find that it has likewise enlightened 
itself on religious phenomena by recognizing them as a 
part, as a variation, of the general phenomenon of the con- 



UNDERSTANDING ON THE RELIGIOUS FIELD 397 

stant, eternal, natural universe. Hence secular nature, 
which is at the same time eternal and temporal, is the 
mother of religious nature. Of course, the child partakes 
of the nature of the mother. Religion, historically con- 
sidered, arises from nature, but the determination of the 
date of the beginning of this specialty is left as much to 
the choice of man as that of the point where the cold and 
the warm meet. The general movement of nature, from 
which arise its specialties, proceeds in infinite time. Its 
transformations are so gradual that every determined 
point constitutes an arbitrary act which is at the same time 
arbitrary and necessary ; necessary for the human being 
who wishes to gain a conception of it. A perfect concep- 
tion of religion, therefore, goes right to the center of the 
question, to the point where the religious specialty reaches 
a characteristic stage, to its freezing point, so to say. 
From this standpoint, heat and cold may be sharply de- 
fined ; likewise religion. If we say, for instance, that re- 
ligion is the conception of a supernatural spirit who rules 
nature, and the reader thinks this definition somewhat 
appropriate, the simple demonstration of the achievements 
of philosophy in the field of understanding or dialectics 
proves that this religious conception is untenable in this 
world of the human mind which knows how to obtain a 
logical picture of its experiences. 

To desire to preserve religion for the people as a 
sharply defined and finite thing is contrary to all logic and 
equivalent to swimming against the tide. On the other 
hand, it is equally illogical to identify religion after the 
manner of Lazarus with the conception of natural infinity 
or infinite nature, because that promotes mental haziness. 

The laws of thought obtained by philosophical research 
give us considerable enlightenment about the infinite 



398 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

material process, the nature of which is sublime enough to 
be worthy of religious devotion, and yet special and mat- 
ter-of-fact enough to wash the dim eyes with natural 
clearness. 

We have already seen in preceding chapters that we 
must first define our standpoint before we can decide 
which is the right or left bank of a river. So it is also in 
the matter of abolishing and maintaining religion for the 
people. It can be done the moment we extend the dis- 
cussion to the realm of infinity. The conception of in- 
finity, called substance by Spinoza, monad by Leibniz, 
thing itself by Kant, the absolute by Hegel, is indeed 
necessary in order to explain anything, not only by the 
fourth root, but by the infinite root of the adequate rea- 
son. To that extent we are agreed that enlightenment, or 
understanding as we say, is not alone a struggle against 
religion, but also for it. In the theory of understanding 
acquired by philosophy, there is contained a decisive re- 
peal of religion. Nevertheless we say with Lazarus: "The 
power of enlightenment and its aim are not expressed in 
negation, not in that which is not believed, but in that 
which is believed, venerated, and preserved." And yet 
every enlightening perception, every understanding result- 
ing from enlightenment, is a negation. In seeking enlight- 
enment, for instance, on understanding, it is necessary, 
in order to prove that it is a natural phenomenon, to deny 
the religious element in so far as it assumes the existence 
of a divine chief spirit whose secondary copy the human 
spirit is supposed to be. Or, in order to gain enlighten- 
ment on the nature of the universe, in order to realize that 
it is a truly universal universe, we are compelled to deny 
the existence of every "higher" world, including the re- 
ligious. But if we desire to become enlightened as to 



UNDERSTANDING ON THE RELIGIOUS FIELD 399 

how it is that religion may not alone be denied, but also 
preserved, we must transfer its origin from an illogical 
other world into the natural and logical universe. Thus 
religion becomes natural and nature religious. 

If worship is confined to the idolization of the sun or 
the cat, every one realizes the temporality of the matter. 
And if we restrict worship to the adoration of the great 
omnipotent spirit, every one realizes the temporality of 
this adoration who has acquired an accurate conception of 
the small human spirit If, on the other hand, we extend 
religious worship to everything which has ever been ven- 
erated, or will ever be venerated, by human beings, in 
other words, if we extend the conception of religion to 
the entire universe, then it assumes a very far-reaching 
significance. 

This is the essence of enlightenment on religion : That 
we may at will expand or contract our conceptions, that 
all things are alike to the extent of representing only one 
nature, that all fantastical ideas, all good and evil spirits 
and ghosts, no matter how "supernaturally" conceived, are 
all natural. 

The essential thing in the enlightenment acquired by 
philosophical study is the appreciation of the fact that 
understanding, enlightenment, science, etc., are not culti- 
vated for their own sake, but must serve the purpose of 
human development, the material interests of which de- 
mand a correct mental picture of the natural processes. 

We have chosen the religious idea for discussion in 
this chapter so that it may serve as a means of illustrating 
the nature of thought in general. We regard it as the 
merit of philosophy to have unveiled this nature. 

Professor Lazarus is quite a pleasing companion. He 
is a fine thinker, saturated with the teachings of the phil- 



1(><! THE POSITIVE OUTCOME 01 PHILOSOPHY 

osophers, not overfond of any particular school, and onlv 
about two hands' breadth removed from our position. But 
this is just enough to demonstrate by his shortcomings the 
advantages of our position which proves that the part of 
the human soul performing the work of thinking is under- 
stood by us at least two hands' breadth better than by this 
prominent psychologist. 

"The function of enlightenment is to recognize that no 
phenomenon can be an effect which has not another phe- 
nomenon as its cause, and to search for the sole cause of 
every effect, noting all its parts and their consecutive 
divisions." 

These words describe the mental work performed by 
the human brain fairly well, but still they require a little 
addition, to the effect that the mental work is no exception 
from any other phenomena, all of which have not alone 
their special, but also one general cause. The cause of all 
causes, of which religion is making an idol, must be pro- 
faned, so to speak, by the cult of science, so that the above 
definition of Lazarus regarding enlightenment would 
read as follows : The sole and true cause of all effects is 
the universe, or the general interdependence of all things. 
But this is not by far the full scope of enlightenment. It 
is further necessary, as Lazarus well says, to note "all its 
parts and their consecutive divisions." We further add : 
The universal cause must be understood not alone in its 
consecutive parts, but also in its co-ordinate parts. It is 
only then that understanding, enlightenment, become per- 
fect. We then find that after all the relation between 
cause and effect, or the relation between the universal 
truth and its natural phenomena, is not a very trenchant 
one, but a relative one. 

"Enlightenment advances in various, in all, fields of 



DISTINCTION BETWEEN CAUSE AND EFFECT 401 

mental life. Religious enlightenment has long been recog- 
nized as the most essential, justly so, and for many rea- 
sons, the chief of them being that religious enlightenment 
is the most important and hence the most bitterly con- 
tested." 

Thus religious enlightenment is a part of universal, 
cosmic, enlightenment. It is a confusing expression to 
say that it is confined to "all fields of mental life." We be- 
lieve to be shedding more light on the question by saying 
that there is enlightenment in all fields, not alone in the 
mental, but also in the cosmic, which unites both the mate- 
rial and mental. To classify this field, that is the exhaus- 
tive task of our understanding, that its exhaustive defini- 
tion. 



XI 



THE DISTINCTION BETWEEN CAUSE AND EFFECT IS ONE OF 
THE MEANS OF UNDERSTANDING 

The processes of the human mind and their subjective 
composition cannot be analyzed in a pure state and with- 
out regard to their objective effects any more than handi- 
work can be explained without the raw material to be 
handled and the products derived therefrom, any more 
than any work can be described in a pure state without 
regard to the product. 

That is the sad defect of old time logic which is an 
obstacle to its further advance : it literally tears things 
out of their connections and forgets the necessity of inter- 
dependence over the need of special study. 

The instrument which produces thought and knowl- 



1:02 POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOl 

In the human brain is not an isolated thing, nor an 
isolated quality. It is connected not only with the brain 
and the nervous system, but also with all qualities of the 
soul. True, thinking is different from feeling-, but it is 
nevertheless a feeling the same as gladness and sorrow. 
Thought is called incomprehensible and the heart unfath- 
omable. It is the function of science, of thinking and 
thought, to fathom and comprehend what as yet is not 
fathomed and not comprehended. 

Just as thinking and understanding are parts of the 
human soul, so the latter is a part of physical and intel- 
lectual man. Together with the physical development of 
man, of the species as well as of the individual, the soul 
also develops and with it that part which is the special 
object of the theory of understanding, viz., thought and 
thinking. Not alone does physical development produce 
intellectual development, but, vice versa, the understand- 
ing reacts on the physical world. The one is not merely a 
cause, nor the other merely an effect. This obsolete dis- 
tinction does not suffice for the full understanding of their 
interrelations. We pay a tribute to the "thoughts on en- 
lightenment" of Professor Lazarus quoted in the previous 
chapter by acknowledging that they throw so much light 
on a certain point that little more than the dot over the 
"i" is required in order to clear up a bad misunderstand- 
ing about the relation of cause and effect. 

Since the time of Aristotle this relation has been called 
a category. We have already noted the statement which 
characterizes the age of enlightenment as one in which the 
causal category, or let us say the distinction between cause 
and effect, became the dominant issue. Other periods live 
with their understanding, with their thoughts, in other 
categories. Though the ancient Greeks knew the distinc- 



DISTINCTION BETWEEN CAUSE AND EFFECT 403 

tion between cause and effect, yet it was far from being 
the dominant point of view in their search after scientific 
understanding. Instead of regarding, as we do today, 
everything as effects which were produced by preceding 
causes, they saw in every process, in every phenomenon, a 
means which had a purpose. The category of means and 
purpose dominated the Greeks. Socrates admired the 
knowledge of nature displayed by Anaxagoras, the stories 
he could tell of sun, moon, and stars. But as Anaxagoras 
had omitted to disclose the reasonable purpose of the pro- 
cesses of nature, Socrates did not think much of such a 
natural science. At that period the means and the pur- 
pose were the measure of reason, the handle of the mind, 
the category of understanding; today causes and effects 
have taken their places. 

Between the golden age of Greece and the era of mod- 
ern science, the socalled night of the Middle Ages, the 
epoch of superstition, extends. If then you started out on 
a voyage and first met an old woman, it meant misfortune 
for .you. Wallenstein cast the horoscope before he 
directed his troops. "Understanding" was gathered from 
the flight of a bird, the cry of an animal, the constellations 
of stars, the meeting with an old woman. The category 
of that period was the sign and its consequences. 

And according to Lazarus, these things were believed 
by brains which were by no means dull. "I refer to a 
name which fills us all with veneration: Kepler believed 
in astrology, in the category of the sign and its conse- 
quence, together with the thinkers of the thousand years 
before him and of his own century. Astrology was a 
science for many centuries, promoted together with 
astronomy . . . and by the same people." 

The peculiar thing in this statement is the reference to 



10 1 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

the category of sign and consequence as a science. This 
category has no longer a place in modern science. 

May not our modern viewpoint, the category in which 
our present day science thinks, the category of cause and 
effect, be equally transitory ? 

The ancients have accomplished lasting scientific re- 
sults in spite of their "purposes." Mediaeval superstition 
with its "signs," its astrology and alchemy, has likewise 
bequeathed to us a few valuable scientific products. And, 
on the other hand, even the greatest partisans of modern 
science do not deny that it is marred by various adven- 
turous vagaries. 

The categories of means and purposes, of signs and 
consequences, are still in vogue today and will be pre- 
served together with that of causes and effects. The 
knowledge that this latter category is likewise but a his- 
torical one and exerts but temporarily a dominating influ- 
ence on science belongs to the positive outcome of phil- 
osophy, and Professor Lazarus, with all his advanced 
standpoint, has remained behind this result by about a 
yard. 

Kindly note that it is not the extinction of the relation 
between cause and effect which we predict, but merely that 
of its dominance. 

Whoever skips lightly over the current of life, will be 
greatly shocked when reading that we place the funda- 
mental pillar of all perception, the category of cause 
and effect, in the same passing boat in which the prophets 
and astrologers rode. One is very prone to belittle the 
faith of others by the name of "superstition" and honor 
one's own superstition by the title of "science." 

Once we have grasped the fact that our intellect has 
no other purpose than that of tracing a human picture of 



DISTINCTION BETWEEN CAUSE AND EFFECT 405 

cosmic processes, and that its penetration of the interior 
of nature, its understanding, explaining, perceiving, know- 
ing, etc., is nothing else, and cannot be anything else, that 
moment it loses its mysterious, transcendental metaphysi- 
cal character. We also understand then, that the great 
spirit above the clouds who is supposed to create the 
world out of nothing, could very well serve the mind as 
a means of explaining things. And it is the same with the 
category of cause and effect, which is a splendid means of 
assisting explanation, but still will not suffice for the re- 
quirements of all time to come. 

The perception that the great spirit above the clouds 
is a free invention of the small human mind has become 
so widely spread that we may well pass on over it to other 
things. 

Among the questions now on the order of business is 
the one whether the "causes" with which modern science 
operates so widely are not in a way creators in miniature 
which produce their effects in a sleight-of-hand way. And 
this erroneous notion is, indeed, the current conception. 

If a stone falls into the water, it is the cause of the 
undulations, but not their creator. It is only a co-oper- 
ator, for the liquid and elastic qualities of the water also 
act as a cause. If the stone falls into butter, it creates at 
best but one undulation, and if this stony creator falls on 
the hard ground, it is all up with the creation of undula- 
tions. This shows that causes are not creators, but rather 
effects which are not effected, but effect themselves. 

The category of cause and effect is a good help in ex- 
planation, so long as it is accompanied by the philosoph- 
ical consciousness that the whole of nature is an infinite 
sea of transformations, which are not created by one great 
or many small creators, but which create themselves. 



406 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

A well-known philosophical author expresses himself 
in the following manner: "During the first weeks of its 
existence, the child has no perception either of the world 
without, or of its own body, or of its soul. Hence its feel- 
ing is not accompanied by the consciousness of an inter- 
action between these three factors. It does not suspect its 
causes." We see that soul, body, and outer world are 
called the three factors of feeling. Now note how each 
one of these three causes or factors is, so to say, the store 
house of innumerable factors or causes, all of which cause 
the feeling of the child. The soul consists of many soul 
parts, the body of many bodily parts, and the outer world 
consists of so many parts that it would consist of ten times 
more parts, if there were any more than innumerable. 

There is no doubt that the child's feeling, or any other, 
does not exist independently, but is dependent on the soul, 
the bod)', and the outer world. This constitutes the in- 
dubitable interrelation of all things. In the winding pro- 
cesses of the self-agitated universe, the category of cause 
and effect serves as a means of enlightenment, by giving 
our mind its help in the systematization of processes. If 
the drop of a stone precedes, the undulations of the water 
follow ; if soul, body, and outer world are present, feeling 
follows. 

The positive outcome of philosophy does not reject the 
services of the category of cause and effect. It only re- 
jects the mystical element in that category in which many 
people, even among those with a '"scientific education," 
still believe. There is no witchcraft in this matter, but 
simply a mechanical systematization and classification of 
natural phenomena in the order of their appearance. So 
long as water remains water and retains its liquid and 
elastic properties, and so long as a stone is a stone, a pon- 



DISTINCTION BETWEEN CAUSE AND EFFECT 407 

derous fellow striking- the water heavily, just so long will 
the splash of the stone be surely and inevitably followed 
by undulations of the water. So long as soul, body, and 
outer world retain their known properties, they will with 
unfailing precision produce feeling. It is no more sur- 
prising that we can affirm this on the strength of our expe- 
rience than that we have a category of cause and effect. 
There exists nothing extraordinary but the condition of 
things, and in this respect all things are alike, so that 
human understanding, cause and effect, or any other 
category, are no more extraordinary than any other condi- 
tion. The only wonder is the universe, but this, being a 
universal wonder, is at the same time trivial, for nothing 
is so familiar as that which is common to all. 

By the help of the viewpoint of cause and effect, man 
throws light on the phenomena of nature. Cause and 
effect serve to enlighten us about the world. 

The way, the method, by which this enlightenment is 
produced, is the special object of our study. We do not 
deny that cause and effect serve us as a means, but only 
as one of many. We honor the category of cause and 
effect far too much when we regard it as the panacea. 
We have seen that formerly other viewpoints served the 
same purpose and still others exist today, some of which 
have a prospect of being valued more highly in the future 
than cause and effect. This category serves very well for 
the explanation of processes which follow one another. 
But there are other phenomena which occur side by side, 
and these must also be elucidated. For such a purpose, 
the category of genus and species is quite as serviceable. 
Haeckel speaks somewhat slightingly of "museum zoolog- 
ists and herbarium botanists," because they merely classify 
animals and plants according to genera and species. The 



408 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

modem zoologists and botanists do not simply consider 
the multiplicity of animals and plants which exist simul- 
taneously, but also the chronological order of the changes 
and transformations, and in this way they have gained 
much more of a life-picture of the zoological and botanical 
world, a picture not alone of its being, but also of its 
growing, of arising and declining. Undoubtedly the 
knowledge of the museum zoologists and herbarium bot- 
anists was meager, narrow, mechanical, and modern 
science offers a far better portrait of truth and life. Still 
this is no reason for overestimating the value of analysis 
by cause and effect. This method supplements the cate- 
gory of genus and species. It assists in enlightening, it 
helps in the process of thought, but it does not render 
other forms of thought superfluous. 

It is essential for the theory of understanding, to rec- 
ognize the special forms of thought of old and new times 
as peculiarities which have, a common nature. This com- 
mon nature of the process of thought, understanding, en- 
lightenment, is a part of the universal world process, and 
not greatly different from it. 

The conception of a cause partly explains the phe- 
nomena of the universe ; but so does the conception of a 
purpose and of a species, in fact, so do all conceptions. 

In the universe all parts are causes, all of them caused, 
produced, created, and yet there is no creator, no pro- 
ducer, no cause. The general produces the special, and 
the latter in turn produces by reaction the general. 

The category of the general and the special, of the uni- 
verse and its parts, contains all other categories in the 
germ. In order to explain the process of thought, we 
must explain it as a part of the universal process. It has 
not caused the creation of the world, neither in a theologi- 



MIND AND MATTER '409 

cal nor in an idealist sense, nor is it a mere effect of the 
brain substance, as the materialists of the eighteenth cen- 
tury represented it. The process of thought and its un- 
derstanding is a peculiarity of the universal cosmos. The 
relation of the general to the special is the clear and typi- 
cal category underlying all other categories. 

One might also apply other names to this category, 
for instance, the one and the many; the essence and the 
form ; the substance and its attributes ; truth and its phe- 
nomena, etc. However, a name is but a breath and a 
sound ; understanding and comprehension are what we 
want in the first place. 



XIII 

MIND AND MATTER: WHICH IS PRIMARY, WHICH 

SECONDARY ? 

It is the merit of the philosophical outcome to have de- 
livered the process of understanding from its mystic ele- 
ments. So long as cause and effect are not recognized as 
a form of thought belonging to the same species with 
many other forms of thought, all of which serve the com- 
mon purpose of illuminating the cosmic processes for the 
human mind by a symbolized picture composed of various 
conceptions, just so long will something mysterious ad- 
here to the category of cause and effect. 

Philosophy is particularly engaged in illuminating the 
understanding. It has learned enough of its specialty to 
know that it is a part of the universe performing the spe- 
cial function of arranging the world of phenomena and 
its smaller circles according to relations of consanguinity 



-±10 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

and chronology. Such an arrangement presents a scien- 
tific picture of the world. The well-known diagram of 
conceptions used by logicians, consisting of a large circle 
symbolizing the general, inside of which smaller circles 
crossing and encircling one another represent the special- 
ties, is a fitting aid in explaining the method by which 
the faculty of understanding arrives at its scientific re- 
sults. Science in general is the sum of all special kinds 
of knowledge, differing from them in no greater degree 
than the human body from the various organs of which it 
is composed. A bodily organ can no more exist outside 
of the body than any particular knowledge can exist out- 
side of the generality of all sciences. No metaphysics is 
possible under this condition. 

As surely as we know that two mountains cannot be 
without a valley between them, just so surely do we know 
that nothing in heaven, on earth, or in any other place can 
lie outside of the general circle of things. Outside of the 
worldly world there can be no other little world. A logi- 
cally constituted human mind cannot think differently. 
And it is likewise impossible to discover such an outside 
world by the help of and within the limits of experience, 
because thought is inseparable from experience and there 
can be no experience without thought. A man who has 
a head upon his shoulders — and there can be no man with- 
out a head — cannot experience any unworldly metaphysi- 
cal world. The faculty of experience, which includes the 
faculty of understanding or perception, is merely empiri- 
cal. Our settled conviction of the unity of the universe is 
an inborn logic. The unity of the world is the supreme 
and most universal category. A closer look at it at once 
reveals the fact that it carries its opposite, the infinite mill- 



MIND AND MATTER 411 

tiplicity, under its heart or in its womb. The general is 
pregnant with specialties. 

This is a comparison, and comparisons limp. A 
mother has other qualities beside that of motherhood, 
while the universe, or the absolute generality, is nothing 
but the bearer, the cause, of all special and separate things. 
It is "pure" motherhood which can no more be without 
children than the children without a mother. In this way, 
no cause can be without effects. A cause without an effect 
— let us dismiss it. The child is as much a cause in moth- 
erhood as it is its effect and product. In the same way 
the universe has never been, and could not be conceived, 
without the many special children which it carries in its 
womb. 

If thought wishes to make for itself a picture, a con- 
ception of the cause of all causes, it must necessarily take 
cognizance of the effects. Thought may very well sepa- 
rate one from the other, but cannot think correctly with- 
out the consciousness that its separating and distinguish- 
ing is only a formality. Imagining, conceiving, knowing, 
perceiving, are so many formalities.* 

But philosophy took its departure from the opposite, 
the wrong, view. It regarded perceiving, understanding, 
as the main thing. It did not use science as a formality, 
as something secondary, as something serving a nature, a 
cause, a purpose, a higher reason, but it started with the 
illogical and irrelevant assumption that the specialty of 
mind, understanding, conceiving, judging, distinguishing, 
is the primary, supreme, self-constituted cause and pur- 
pose, instead of being an element in logic. Even in 



[* By means of which we picture and explain the monistic inter- 
relation of all things, called universe, nature and cosmos. — Editor.] 



412 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

Hegel's logic, which., by the way, has given us much light 
on the process of thought, this confounding of the original 
with the copy is the cause of an almost impenetrable 
mysticism. 

Not nature., but science is to those idealist philosophers 
the source of truth. The "true idea" surpassed everything 
with them. This "idea" is forced by Hegel to roll about, 
and wind, and twist as if it were not a natural child, but a 
metaphysical dragon. But we cannot deny that in these 
twistings and windings of the Hegelian dragon the condi- 
tion of the mind is exposed in all its peculiarities and 
nakedness. 

According to Hegel's theosophical opinion I do not be- 
come aware of my friend in material intercourse and 
bodily touch. Hegel's mark of a true friend is not that 
he proves true in life, but that he corresponds "to his 
idea." The "idea" of true friendship is for the idealist the 
measure of friendly truth, just as Plato measures the ideal 
or true condition of states and cooking pots of this valley 
of sorrows by the standard of an "idea" of the state, or an 
"idea" of the cooking pot, supposed to be derived from 
some other world. 

It is surely a valuable gift of nature that the human 
mind can form its ideals. But it is a gift that has also 
caused much trouble and which requires for its higher 
development the clear understanding that ideals are con- 
structed out of real materials. Without this understand- 
ing the human race will never succeed in making a rea- 
sonable use of its ideal faculty. The beautiful ideal of 
true friendship may stimulate us to emulation. But the 
knowledge that it is nothing but an ideal which in reality 
is always mixed with a little falseness serves as no mean 
antidote against sentimental transcendentalism. And the 



MIND AND MATTER 413 

same holds true of truth, liberty, justice, equality, brother- 
hood, etc. 

The striving after an ideal is very good, but it does no 
harm to be conscious of the fact and clearly see that any 
ideal can never be realized without some admixture of its 
opposite. What is it that Lessing says ? "If God were to 
offer me the search for truth in his left hand, and truth in 
his right, I should grasp his left hand and say: Father, 
keep truth, it is for you alone." 

It has not been the task of philosophy to give us a true 
mind picture of the world. This it cannot do, this cannot 
be done by any scientific specialty. It may be done by 
the totality of sciences, and even by them only approxi- 
mately. Even with them striving is a higher truth and of 
higher value than knowing. I repeat, then : It is not the 
particular task of philosophy to furnish a true picture of 
the world, but rather to investigate the method by which 
the human mind arrives at its world pictures. That is its 
work, and it is the object of this book to sketch its outline. 

A sketch is in itself an inexact piece of work. I may 
be blamed for jumbling together such terms as world, 
cosmos, universe, nature, or such others as ideas, judg- 
ment, conclusion, thought, mind, intellect, etc., and for 
using them as synonyms when many of them have already 
been assigned their fixed meaning in the classification of 
science. But this is the point which I emphasize, that the 
method of science, of thought, has the twofold nature of 
making fixed terms and still remaining pliable. 

Science not only defines what this or that is, but also 
how it moves, how it originates, passes away, and still 
remains ; how it is fixed and yet at the same time moving. 
The real being of which science treats, viz., the universe, 
is not alone present, but also past and future, and it is 



414 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

not alone this or that, but it is everything-. Even nothing 
is something belonging to the aggregate life. 

This dialectic statement is rather incomprehensible to 
the unphilosophical brain. Nothing and something are 
conceptions so widely diverging from one another in the 
unphilosophical mind that they seem far more apart than 
heavenly bliss is supposed to be separated from earthly 
misery, according to the declarations of clergymen. 
Clergymen are transcendental logicians, and it is likewise 
transcendental to regard nothing as an absolute nothing. 
It cannot be denied that it is at least a conception or a 
term. Therefore, whether little or much, it is something. 
We cannot get out of existence, out of the universe, any 
more than Miinchhausen can pull himself out of a swamp 
by his pigtail. 

There can be no absolute nothing, because the absolute 
is synonymous with the universe, and everything else is 
relative. So it is also with nothing. It simply has the 
significance of not being the main thing. To say: This 
is nothing means it is not that which is essential at this 
time and place. This man is nothing simply means that 
he is not a man out of the ordinary, and it does not at all 
signify that he is nothing at all. 

The category of being and not being, like all cate- 
gories,* which appear as something fixed to the sound but 
ill-informed mind, is really something shifting. Its poles 
fuse and flow into one another, its differences are not per- 
fectly radical. These categories give us an illustration of 
the mobile universe, which is a unit composed of its oppo- 
site, multiplicity. 



♦That is, like all categories that are subdivisions of the absolute 
being, of general existence, pertaining only to the phenomena or 
snec!?lti°s. which, however, in their entir^tv constitute the absolute 
the absolute being or monistic nature.— Editor. 



MIND AMD MATTER 415 

The positive outcome of philosophy has for its climax 
the understanding that the world is multifarious, and that 
this multiplicity is uniform in possessing the universal 
nature in common. The sciences must represent these 
objects in such a contradictory way, because all things live 
in reality in this contradiction. What the museum zoolo- 
gists and the herbarium botanists have accomplished on 
the field of zoology and botany in the category of space, 
has been accepted by the Darwinians with the addition of 
the variety of those subjects in the category of time. 
Either class of scientists categorizes, classifies, systema- 
tizes. The chemists do the same with substances and 
forces, and so does Hegel with his categories of being and 
not being, quantity and quality, substance and attribute, 
thing and quality, cause and effect, etc. He makes all 
things flow into one another, rise, pass, move, and he is 
right in doing so. Everything moves and belongs 
together. 

But that which Hegel missed and which is added by us 
consists in the further perception that the flow and the 
variability of the categories just quoted is only an illustra- 
tion of the necessary variability and interaction of all 
thoughts and conceptions, which are, and must be, nothing 
but illustrations and reflexes of the universal life. 

However, the idealist philosophers who have an of 
them contributed materially toward this ultimate special 
knowledge, are still more or less under the mistaken im- 
pression that the process of thinking is the true process 
and the true original, and that the true original, nature or 
the material universe, is only a secondary phenomenon. 
We now insist on having it understood that the cosmic 
interaction of phenomena, the universal living world, is 
the truth and life. 



416 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

Is the world a concept ? Is it an idea ? It may be con- 
ceived and grasped by the mind., but it does and is more 
than that. It surpasses our understanding in the past, the 
present, and the future. It is infinite in quantity and 
quality. How do we know that? We say in the same 
breath that we do not know everything which is passing, 
has passed, and will pass in the world ; we do not under- 
stand the whole, and yet we claim to have fully under- 
stood that this whole universe is not a mere idea, but 
something absolute, something more than a conception or 
an intuitive knowledge, something real and true, some- 
thing infinite. How do we solve this contradiction 

The science of the limitation of the individual and of 
the collective human intellect is identical with the univer- 
sal concept ; in other words, it is innate in the human intel- 
lect to know that it is a limited part of the absolute uni- 
verse. This intellectual faculty of ours is no less natural 
and aboriginal than the faculty of trees to become green 
in summer and that of the spiders to spread their nets. 
Although the intellect is a limited part of the unlimited 
and aware of this fact, yet its faculty of knowing, under- 
standing, judging, is a universal one. No intellect is pos- 
sible or conceivable which can do more than the instru- 
ment of thought given by nature to the human race. We 
may indeed conceive of a mental giant. But when we take 
a closer look, every one will perceive that this mental giant 
cannot get outside of the traditional race of thinkers, un- 
less he is supposed to be the creature of imagination. 

Thinking, knowing, understanding, are universal. I 
can perceive all things in about the same way that I can 
see all cobble stones. I can see them all, but I cannot see 
everything that they are composed of, I cannot see, for in- 
stance, that they are heavy and ponderable. In the same 



MIND AND MATTER 417 

way all things may be perceived, but not everything that 
belongs to them. They do not dissolve in understanding, 
in other words, understanding is only a part of the uni- 
verse, all of which may be perceived, but the understand- 
ing of which is not the whole, since our intellect is but a 
part of the universe. 

Everything may be understood, but understanding is 
not everything. Every pug-dog is a dog, but every dog 
is not a pug-dog. The conflict of idealism and material- 
ism rests on this same conflict between genus and subordi- 
nate species. The idealist incarnate contends that all 
things are ideas, while we strive to make him see that 
ideal things and material things are two species of the 
same genus, and that they should be given a common fam- 
ily or general name beside their special name, on account 
of their common nature and for the purpose of a sound 
logic. Wherever this understanding has been acquired, 
the quarrel between idealists and materialists appears in 
the light of a mere bandying of words. 

Everything is large, everything is small, everything 
extended through space and time, everything cause and 
everything effect, everything a whole and a part, because 
everything is the essence of everything, because every- 
thing is contained in the all, everything related, every- 
thing connected, everything interdependent. The con- 
ception of all as the absolute, the content of which consists 
of innumerable relativities, the concept of the all as the 
universal truth which reflects many phenomena, that is 
the basis of the science of understanding. 



US THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

XIII 

THE EXTENT TO WHICH THE DOUBTS OF THE POSSIBILITY 
OF CLEAR AND ACCURATE UNDERSTANDING HAVE BEEN 
OVERO'M E 

A contemporaneous professor of philosophy, Kuno 
Fischer, of Jena, says : "The problem of modern philos- 
ophy is the understanding of things.'' But this problem 
(loos not occupy modern philosophy alone; it was also con- 
ed by ancient philosophy. Even more, it belongs to 
the whole world. All the world, I mean the whole human 
world, and especially the sciences, search after understand- 
ing. I do not say this for the purpose of setting the Pro- 
fessor right, for I acknowledge that he is a fairly deserv- 
ing philosopher. If I cared to go through his works, I 
should surely find other passages which state the problem 
of philosophy more accurately and concretely, to the effect 
that philosophy does not strive merely for the indefinite 
"understanding of things," but rather for the special un- 
derstanding of that particular thing which bears the name 
of "understanding." Philosophy at the climax of its de- 
velopment seeks to understand "understanding." It has 
seriously attempted the solution of this problem so long as 
men think, so far as our historical records go. 

After that which we have already said about the be- 
ginning and the end of things and about their immortality, 
it will be easily understood that the thing called under- 
standing has no more historical beginning than all the 
rest. The known grows out of the unknown, the con- 
scious out of the unconscious. Our modern conscious- 
ness, though agreeably cultivated, is still an undeveloped, 
unconscious consciousness. Nevertheless, development 
has gone far enough to make it plain that understanding 



PROGRESS TOWARD CLEAR UNDERSTANDING 419 

is anti-religious. Especially the understanding of under- 
standing, the outcome of positive philosophy, has a pro- 
nounced anti-religious, and to that extent "destructive," 
tendency. But one should not have an exaggerated idea 
of this destruction. Here, under this sun, nothing is de- 
stroyed without leaving the basis for the growth of new 
life from the ruins. It belongs to the conception of the 
universe to understand that it is the main conception re- 
quired for the conception of conception, for the under- 
standing of understanding. 

The history of philosophy begins with the decay of 
heathen religion, and the history of modern philosophy 
with the decay of Christian religion. Since religion must 
be preserved for the people according to the official declar- 
ations of the rulers, the official professors are not clear 
and accurate expounders of the positive outcome of phil- 
osophy. No matter how great the work of Spinoza, Leib- 
niz, Kant, and Hegel may be, yet the followers of Kant 
and Hegel have no freedom of research, and Kuno 
Fischer, although very close to the root of the subject, is 
nevertheless doomed to remain in the mystification of the 
function of conceiving and of understanding. His pro- 
fession clouds his judgment. 

"Nature," says this professor, "is regarded as the first 
object of understanding, as the principle from which 
everything else follows. In this respect modern philos- 
ophy is naturalistic. It is taken for granted that nature 
can be understood, or that the possibility of understand- 
ing things is given. Modern philosophy makes this as- 
sumption dogmatically. . . . The Kantian philos- 
ophy, on the other hand, assumes a critical, not a dog- 
matic, attitude toward the possibility of understanding." 
(System of Logic and Metaphysics, by Kuno Fischer, sec- 



120 TITE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

ond edition, pages 101 and 109.) In this latter, critical, 
stage, the subject is kept rather hot by the professors of 
philosophy. The critics are still engaged in exclaiming: 
P>e amazed, oh world ! How is understanding possible ? 

In the first place., there is nothing to be amazed at. 
Why is not the "naturalistic" philosopher consistent by 
recognizing his special object, understanding, as a natural 
object? 

The "'supposition" that an understanding of things is 
possible, is neither a supposition nor anything "dogmatic." 

The philosophers should abandon their old hobby of 
trying to prove anything by syllogisms. Nowadays, a case 
is not substantiated by words, but by facts, by deeds. The 
sciences are sufficiently equipped, and thus the "possibility 
of understanding" is demonstrated beyond a doubt. 

"But," say the critics who are so wise that they hear 
the grass growing, "are those perceptions which are pro- 
duced by the exact sciences really perceptions? Are they 
not simply substitutes? Those sciences recognize only 
the phenomena of things ; but where is the understanding 
which perceives the truth?" 

We shall offer it to them. You are naturalists. Well, 
then, nature is the truth. Or are you spiritualists who 
make a metaphysical distinction between the truth and 
the phenomenon ? To understand means to distinguish 
and judge. The semblance must be distinguished from 
the truth, but not in an excessive manner. It must be re- 
membered that even the most evil semblance is a natural 
phenomenon, and the sublimest truth is only revealed by 
phenomena, just because it is natural. 

But the old logic cannot stand any contradictions. 
Semblance and truth are contradictions for it and they 
cannot be reconciled by it. But the irreconcilable simply 



PROGRESS TOWARD CLEAR UNDERSTANDING 421 

consists in entertaining, in this monistic world, thoughts 
which are supposed to be totally different. Hence old 
style logic lacks entirely the mediating manner of thought 
which does not elevate understanding and its faculty of 
thought to the skies, but is satisfied to regard it as a very 
valuable, but still natural, quality. 

The old logic could not construct any valid rules of 
thought, because it thought too transcendentally of think- 
ing itself. It was not satisfied that thought is only a 
faculty, a mode of doing, a part of true nature, but the 
nature of truth was spiritualized by it into a transcen- 
dental being. Instead of grasping the conception of spirit 
with blood and flesh, it tries to dissolve blood and flesh 
into ideas. That would be well enough, if such a solution 
of the riddles were meant to have no other significance 
than that of symbols. 

The old logic contains long chapters about the proofs 
of truth. It is supposed to be "identical" with the idea 
and to be proven by ideas. This would be all right, if we 
remained conscious of the secondary relation in which the 
idea and understanding stand to truth. But old line logic 
is not conscious of this relation. On the contrary. Its 
consciousness distorts that relation. It elevates the mind 
to the first place and relegates blood and flesh to the last. 

'The necessity of a conception is proven by the impos- 
sibility of its opposite. An idea is contradicted by proving 
its impossibility. This impossibility is demonstrated when 
it can be proven that a thing is at the same time A and 
not-A, or when it can be shown that a thing is neither A 
nor not-A. The first mode of proof is called antinomy, 
the second, dilemma." 

In this representation of the. logical proof much is said 
of the "thing," for instance this: A thing cannot be at 



432 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

the same time straight and crooked, true and untrue, light 
and dark. The excellence of this doctrine is easily appar- 
ent, because it is overlooked that the concept "thing" is 
not a fixed, but a variable one. If a straight line is a 
thing, and a crooked line another thing, and if these two 
things are held to be opposed to one another, then the 
above logic is the most justified in the world. But who 
claims that there are not many straight lines which are 
crooked at one end, which run straight on for a certain 
distance and then turn? Who will define to us what a 
line is ? A line may be composed of 10, 20, 30, etc., parts, 
and each part is a line. 

Before anything to the point can be said about the 
logical laws, it is necessary to say above all how it stands 
with the relation of the whole to its parts, of the universe 
to its subdivisions. The old theological question of God 
and his creatures, the old metaphysical question of the 
unity and the multiplicity, of truth and its phenomena, 
reason and consequence, etc., in one word, the question of 
metaphysical categories must be solved and settled before 
the definition of the minor factors of understanding, the 
questions of formal logic, can be attempted. 

What is a "thing?" A clergyman would answer: 
Only God is something, everything else is nothing! And 
we say: Only the universe is something, and everything 
in it consists of vacillating, changing, precarious, vari- 
colored, fluid, variable phenomena or relativities. 

In our times, up to which the theologians have specu- 
lated so much and contributed so little to understanding, 
one can hardly touch on the God concept without annoy- 
ing the reader. Yet it is very essential for a thorough 
understanding of the human mind to point out that the 
God concept and the universe concept are analogous con- 



PROGRESS TOWARD CLEAR UNDERSTANDING 423 

cepts. Not in vain have the first minds of modern philos- 
ophy, such as Cartesius, Spinoza, Leibniz, occupied them- 
selves so closely with the God concept. They invented the 
socalled ontological proof of the existence of God. This 
proof if applied to the universe, testifies to its divinity. A 
metaphysical cloud pusher as well as the physical cosmos 
are fundamentally concepts of the most perfect being. It 
makes little difference whether we say that the concept of 
the universe, or of the cosmos, or of the most perfect 
being is innate in man. If this concept were not existing, 
it would lack the main thing required for its perfection. 
Hence the most perfect being must exist. And it does. 
It is the universe, and everything belongs to its existence. 
Nothing is excluded from it, least of all understanding. 
The latter is, therfore, not only possible, but a fact, which 
is proven by the very concept of the most perfect being. 

This ought to be sufficient to help us over the doubts 
of the critics, especially over Kantian criticism, or rather 
dualism. Kant did not care to accept the dogma of the 
possibility of understanding without examination; he 
wished to investigate first. He then discovered that we 
may understand correctly, provided we remain with our 
understanding on the field of common experience; in 
other words, in the physical universe, and refrain from 
digressing into the metaphysical heaven. But he did not 
understand that the metaphysical heaven against which 
he warns us would be an obsolete standpoint in our days. 

He still permits that transcendental possibility to re- 
main and while he warns us not to stray into it with our 
understanding he omits to tell us to also keep away from 
it with our intuition. Kant struggles about between the 
"thing as phenomenon" and the "thing itself." The 
former is material and may be understood, the latter is 



4:24 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

supernatural and may be believed or divined. With this 
doctrine, he again made understanding, the object of mod- 
ern philosophy., problematical, thus inviting us to investi- 
gate further. 

This we have done, and it is now the positive outcome 
of philosophy to know clearly and definitely and under- 
stand that understanding is not only a part of this world 
of phenomena, but a true part of the general truth, beside 
which there is no other truth, and which is the most per- 
fect being. 

Philosophy took its departure from confused wrang- 
ling about that which is and that which is not, especially 
from the religious disappointments met by the Greek 
nation when its world of deities dissolved into phantasms. 
Humanity demands a positive, strong, unequivocal, relia- 
ble understanding. Now, in this world of ours, the solid 
is so mixed with the fluid, the imperishable with the per- 
ishable, that a total separation is impossible. Neverthe- 
less our intellect catches itself continually making separa- 
tions and distinctions. Should not that appear mysterious 
to it? The necessary and natural result was the problem 
of the theory of understanding, the special question of 
philosophy : Which is the way to an indubitably clear and 
positive understanding? 

The summit of Grecian philosophy bears the name of 
Aristotle. He was a practical man who did not like to 
stray into the distance when he could find good things 
near by, and he did not concern himself about the descent 
of understanding. Its platonic origin from an ideal world 
went instinctively against his grain. He, therefore, took 
hold of the question at the nearest end and analyzed the 
positive knowledge available at that time. But since 
Grecian science and the knowledge of Aristotlean times 



PROGRESS TOWARD CLEAR UNDERSTANDING 425 

were' rather slim, his attempt to demonstrate logic did not 
produce any decisive results. But it had been discovered 
that it was possible to make positive deductions from fixed 
premises. 

Aristotle clung to this. He showed clearly and defi- 
nitely, excellently and substantially, how logical deduc- 
tions should be made in order to arrive at positive under- 
standing. All dogs are watchful. My pug-dog is a dog, 
therefore it is watchful. What can be more evident? 
Why, then, speculate about God, freedom, and immor- 
tality, when indubitable knowledge may be obtained by 
the formal method of exact deductions ? 

But Aristotle had overlooked something, or, being a 
practical man, perhaps overlooked it intentionally. The 
premise from which he deducted the watchfulness of dogs 
in general, was handed down by tradition and had been 
accepted on faith. But was it founded on fact? Could 
there not be some dogs who lacked the quality of watch- 
fulness, and might not our pug-dog be very unreliable, in 
spite of all exact deductions ? In the case of the pug-dog 
this would not be of very great moment. But what about 
the question of the beginning and end of the world, or the 
question of the existence of God ? The Grecian gods had 
been outgrown by Aristotle. 

The history of logic, and of philosophy in general, is 
interrupted by Christianity and by the decline of the 
antique world, until the reformation opens a new era. 
The Catholic church had^ in its own way, thoroughly set- 
tled the great questions of the true nature of things, of 
beginning and end, reason and consequence. But when 
it, and with it Christianity, began to disintegrate, disbelief 
once more posed in the brains of the philosophers the old 
question : How do we obtain reliable and true understand- 



•126 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

ing ? Reliability and truth were at that time still identical. 

Bacon and Descartes are the men who started the in- 
vestigation. Both of them were disgusted with Aristotle 
and with his formal logic, particularly with the subtleties 
of scholasticism. It did not satisfy this new epoch to 
found positive understanding on traditional contentions 
and exact deductions therefrom. It is a radical epoch 
and, therefore, epoch-making. The new philosophers 
have the aim of unequivocal understanding in common 
with the ancient philosophers. Bacon still connects him- 
self with the stock in trade of the past. His historian 
says of him that one should not reiterate that Bacon took 
his departure from experience, for this means nothing or 
nothing more than that Columbus was a mariner while 
the main thing is that he discovered America. . . . He 
wanted to find a new logic corresponding to the new life. 
. . . The inventive human mind has created the new 
time, the compass, the powder, the art of typography. . . 
He wanted a new logic which corresponded to the spirit 
of invention. He, the philosopher of invention, was 
Lord Chancellor of England, was a man of the world. 
Not only himself, but also his science, was too ambitious, 
too full of energy, too world-embracing, for him to bury 
himself in solitude. That is a glory for a philosopher, 
but at the same time an obstacle for his special task, for 
the new logic. He recognized the import of his task only 
in its general outlines. But his contemporary and suc- 
cessor Descartes approached the matter more radically 
and pointedly. 

Although in recent times the human mind had demon- 
strated its positive faculty of understanding in natural 
sciences, especially by inventions, still it was prejudiced 
by religious improbabilities in its great premises dealing 



PROGRESS TOWARD CLEAR UNDERSTANDING 427 

with the essence of things and men, with the "good, true, 
and beautiful," as the ancients called it. In order to end 
his doubts, Descartes elevates radical doubt to the posi- 
tion of a principle and of a starting point for all under- 
standing. Then he cannot doubt that he is at least search- 
ing for truth. He who does not believe in any under- 
standing, any science, any inventions, cannot doubt at all 
events that the impulse for understanding is there. It, at 
least, is undeniable. Cogito, ergo sum — I think, therefore 
I am — that is a premise which cannot be shaken. The rest, 
thinks Descartes, may be deducted by Aristotlean methods. 

With this thought, the philosopher of modern times 
relapsed into the old error that anything positively true 
could be ascertained with logical formulas. His con- 
sciousness of the thoughts stirring in his brain, I might 
say his flesh and blood, convinced him by matter-of-fact 
evidence of the reality of their existence. 

This fact had hitherto been misunderstood. It is 
claimed that Descartes could convince himself only of the 
existence of his soul, of his thought, by evidence. No, 
my feeling, my sight, my hearing, etc., are just as evident 
to me as my thinking, and simultaneously with sight and 
hearing that which is heard and seen. The separation of 
subject and object can and must be merely a formality. 

The Descartian thesis has been distorted into the state- 
ment that nothing is evident to man but his own sub- 
jective conception. And the ideology has been carried to 
the extreme of calling the whole world an idea, a phantas- 
magoria. True, Descartes needed God in order to be sure 
that his conceptions did not cheat him. 

In order to prove that we no longer need such extrav- 
agant means in our times, I shall devote another chapter 
to this subject. 



428 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME Of .PHILOSOPHY 

XIV 

CONTINUATION OF THE DISCUSSION ON THE DIFFERENCE 
BETWEEN DOUBTFUL AND EVIDENT UNDERSTANDING 

Let us divide the history of civilization into two 
periods. In the first, the less civilized period, the doubt- 
ful perceptions predominate, in the second period the 
evident ones. ( >ur special investigation of the correct 
way of evident understanding began in the first period in 
which the doubtful perceptions, commonly called errors, 
predominated. In this period, the gods rule in heaven and 
imagination on earth. 

To get rid of errors meant originally to lose gods and 
heaven. The ideal world was the cause of metaphysics. 
Metaphysics which drew the investigation of the super- 
natural into the circle of its activity, did so for the pur- 
pose of enlightening the human mind. Thus its problem 
was from the outset of a twofold nature. It desires to 
throw light on the natural process of thought, which was 
temporarily unbalanced by a bent for the supernatural, 
and for this reason it first loses itself in the clouds. 

While human reason has now become soberer, the 
meaning of the term "metaphysics" has also been sobered 
down. Our contemporaneous metaphysicians speak no 
longer of such transcendental things as the ancients did. 
Present day metaphysics occupies itself with such abstract 
ideas as the thing and nothing, being and coming into be- 
ing, matter and force, truth and error. 

Particularly the investigation of doubtful, erroneous, 
and evident or true understanding, which we here discuss, 
is a part of metaphysics. 

The term metaphysics, then, has a double meaning, 



DOUBTFUL AND EVIDENT UNDERSTANDING 429 

one of them transcendental and extravagant, the other 
natural and within sober limits. Our sober task of dem- 
onstrating the positive outcome of philosophy that 
acquired sober methods in dealing with understanding 
also compels us to face transcendental metaphysics, which 
sobers down in the course of time and develops into its 
opposite, into pure, bare, naked physics. 

The divine has become human, the transcendental 
sober, and so understanding grows ever more unequivo- 
cal and evident in the progress of history. 

In order to become clear on the problem of under- 
standing, we must cease to turn our eyes to any one indi- 
vidual opinion, thought, knowledge, or perception. We 
must rather consider the process of understanding in its 
entirety. We then notice the development from doubt to 
evidence, from errors to true understanding. At the same 
time we become aware how unwise it was to entertain such 
an exaggerated idea of the contrast between truth and 
error. 

Whoever searches for true and evident understanding 
will not find it in Jerusalem, nor in Jericho, nor in the 
spirit ; not in any single thing," but in the universe. There 
the known emerges from the unknown so gradually that 
no beginning can be traced. Understanding comes into 
being and grows, is partly erroneous and partly accurate, 
becomes more and more evident. But there is never an 
absolutely true understanding any more than there can be 
an absolutely faulty one. Only the universe, but not any 
single thing, is absolute, imperishable, and impregnable. 

In order to accurately define understanding, we must 
separate it from misunderstanding, but not too far, not 
excessively, otherwise the thing becomes extravagant, 
The limited formal logic teaches, indeed, that the same 



430 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

thing cannot be affirmed and denied at the same time, 
affirmation and denial being contradictions. But such a 
logic is very narrow. Herbs are not weeds. Weeds are 
the negation of herbs, and still weeds are herbs. An 
erroneous understanding is a negation of a true under- 
standing, error is not truth, and still it exists in truth. 
There is no absolute error any more than perceptions are 
the truth itself. All perceptions are and remain nothing 
but symbols or reflections of truth. 

We do not wish to confound error with truth and 
make a stew of them, but rather understand them both. 
The mixing is done by the man who opposes them as irre- 
concilable contradictions. Let us first note the mistake 
committed in so doing. By so opposing error and truth 
something is done which is not intended, not known. The 
intention is to confront the erroneous understanding with 
truth. For this purpose, error is assumed to be the same 
as erroneous understanding, which may be admitted ; but 
true understanding and truth are two different things and 
must be kept separate, if we wish to arrive at clear and 
unmistakable results. If we formulate the question in this 
way : How do erroneous and true understanding differ, 
we are nearer to the desired clarity by two solar distances. 
We then find that error and understanding do not exclude 
one another, but are two species of the same genus, two 
individuals of the same family. 

Two times two is not alone four ; this is only a part 
of the truth ; it is also four times one, or eight times one- 
half, or one plus three, or sixteen times one-quarter, etc. 
The man who first observed that the sun circled around 
the earth once a day, committed a mistake, yet he made a 
true perception. The apparent circulation of the sun in 
twenty-four hours around the earth is a substantial part 



DOUBTFUL AND EVIDENT UNDERSTANDING 431 

of the understanding which illumines the relation of the 
motion of the sun and of the earth. No truth is merely 
simple, but it is at the same time composed of an infinite 
number of partial truths. The semblance must not be 
contradictorily separated from truth, in an extravagant 
sense, but is part of truth, just as all errors contribute 
toward true understanding. In so far as all perceptions 
are limited, they are errors, partial truths. True under- 
standing requires above all the backing of the conscious 
recognition that it is a limited part of the unlimited uni- 
verse. 

The cosmic relation of the whole to its parts, of the 
general to the special, must be considered in order to get 
a clear conception of the nature of the human understand- 
ing. 

Understanding or knowledge, thinking, perceiving, 
reasoning, must, for the purpose of investigation, not be 
excessively separated from other phenomena. In a way, 
every object which is chosen for special study is isolated. 
In saying, "in a way," I mean that the separation of the 
objects of study from other world objects must be con- 
sciously moderate, not exaggerated. The separation of 
the intellect from other objects or subjects when investi- 
gating them, must be accompanied by the recognition 
that such a separation is not excessive, but only formal. 
In separating a board, for the purpose of studying its con- 
dition, from other boards or things and finding that it is 
black, I must still remember that this board is black only 
on account of its interdependence with the whole world 
process ; that the blackness which it possesses is not of 
its own making, but that light, and eyes, and the whole 
cosmic connection belong to it. In this way every special 
perception becomes a proportionate part in the chain of 



L32 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

universal perceptions, and this again a proportionate part 
of the universal life. 

That this evident universal life is not a mere sem- 
blance, not a ghost, not a baseless imagination, but the 
truth, is made evident to the thinking man by his con- 
sciousness, reason, common sense. True, he has been de- 
ceived by them, sometimes. But it requires no logic, no 
syllogistic proof, to know that they are telling the truth in 
this respect. 

It is nevertheless important to give this proof, because 
by it the peculiar nature of our intellect is revealed, of the 
object the study of which is the special concern of phil- 
osophy. 

This proof, that the universe is the universal truth, 
was first attempted by philosophy in an indirect way, by 
casting about in vain for a metaphysical truth. 

The philosopher Kant was no doubt the thinker who 
confined the use of understanding most strictly to the 
domain of experience. Now, if we recognize that this 
field is universal, we become aware that the assumed Kan- 
tian limitation is not a limitation at all. The human mind 
is a universal instrument, the special productions of which 
all belong to general truth. Though we make a distinc- 
tion between the doubtful and the positive, the outcome of 
philosophy teaches us that it must be no excessive distinc- 
tion, but must be backed up by the consciousness that all 
evidence is composed of probabilities, of phenomena of 
truth, of parts of truth. 

The thinking understanding — this is the result of phil- 
osophy — is no more evident than anything else and de- 
rives its existence not from itself, but from the universal 
life. This universal life from which thought derives its 
perceptions, from which understanding derives its enlight- 



DOUBTFUL AND EVIDENT UNDERSTANDING 433 

enment, does not only exist as a general thing, but also 
in the form of infinitely varied individualities. And gen- 
eralization, the relation of things, their number and ex- 
tension, are no more, and no less, infinite than individual- 
ization and specialization. Every tree in the forest, every 
grain of a pile of sand, are individual, separate, distinct. 
Every particle of every grain of sand is distinctly individ- 
ual. And the infinite individualization of nature goes so 
far that, just as the human individual is different every 
day, every hour, every moment, so is the individual grain 
of sand, even though its transformations were not to be- 
come noticeable until after thousands of years, by accum- 
ulated changes. By classifying this contradictory, in- 
finitely general and infinitely individual nature in groups 
according to time and space, in classes, genera, families, 
species, orders, and other subdivisions, we are discerning 
and understanding. 

In the universe, every group is an individual and every 
individual is a group. The uniformity of nature is not 
greater than its variety. Both of them are infinite. We 
distinguish between time and space. Every moment is 
composed of little moments. The smallest division of 
time cannot be denominated any more than the largest, 
just because there is no smallest and no largest in the uni- 
verse, neither in time nor in space. Atoms are groups. 
As smallest parts they exist only in our thoughts and thus 
give excellent service in chemistry. The consciousness 
that they are not tangible, but only mental things, does 
not detract from their usefulness, but heightens it still 
more. 

It is the nature of human intelligence to divide, 
classify, group. We divide the world into four cardinal 
points ; we also divide it into two kingdoms, the kingdom 



434 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME of philosophy 

of the mind and the kingdom of nature ; the latter we again 
subdivide into the organic and the inorganic, or perhaps 
into the mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms. In 
short, science seeks to illumine the universe by division. 
The question then arises: Which is the genuine and true 
division ? Where does the variety of science, its undecided 
vaccillation end, and when does understanding become 
stable? 

The reader should remember that the things, the 
objects of understanding, are not fixed, but also variable 
objects, and that the whole universe is moving, progress- 
ing; that especially the human mind becomes more and 
more affluent from century to century, from year to year, 
and that for this reason science is not alone compelled to 
fix things, but also to remain in flow. The fixed and the 
fluid are not so widely separated in science any more, that 
the evidence could not be evident and yet at the same time 
a little doubtful. 

Man and his understanding are progressive, and for 
this reason he must progress by experience in his classifi- 
cations, conceptions, and sciences. 

The fixed, impregnable, socalled apodictical facts are 
nothing but tautologies, if seen at close range. After it 
has become common usage to call only heavy and tangi- 
ble things bodies, it is an apodictical fact that all bodies 
are heavy and tangible. If the conceptions of vapor, 
water and ice are restricted by common usage and by 
science to the three stages of aggregation of the same 
substance, then we need not wonder at our firm assur- 
ance that the water will always remain fluid in all time 
to come, also above the "stars. =This signifies nothing' 
more than that we conceive of the things as solid which 
we call solid, and of those jas. fluid which we call fluid, 



DOUBTFUL AND EVIDENT UNDERSTANDING 435 

but it does not cnange the fact that our faculty of under- 
standing or perceiving gives us only an approximate pic- 
ture of natural processes, in which the solid and the fluid 
are neither wholly opposed nor different, but where the 
positive and the negative gradually flow into one an- 
other. 

The philosophers produced a very good conception 
of understanding by developing the concept of truth 
step by step and finally coming to quite exact results. 
But this "quite exact" must only be accepted in a reason- 
able sense, not in an extravagant one. Truth as the in- 
finite, as the sum total of all things and qualities, is "in 
itself" quite right, but it cannot be accurately reproduced, 
not even by means of the mind, of reason, or understand- 
ing. The means is smaller than the purpose, is subordi- 
nate to purpose. So is our faculty of understanding only 
a subordinate servant of truth, of the universe. The lat- 
ter is absolutely evident, true, indubitable, and positive. 
It does not vitiate the sublimity of this world in the least 
that it is veiled by appearances, by error, by untruth. 
On the contrary. Without sin there is no virtue, and 
without error there is no understanding, no truth. The 
negative, the weakness, the sin and error, are overcome, 
and thereby truth shines in full splendor. The universe, 
the general truth, is a progressive thing. It is absolute, 
but not at any fixed time or place, but only in the com- 
bined unity of all time and space. 

It is sometimes said that this is too much for our in- 
tellect, that we cannot understand this. It is true that 
we cannot squeeze this into any of our categories, of our 
fundamental conceptions, unless we place the category of 
illimited and indeterminable and infinite truth at the be- 
ginning of them. If that is not quite clear and plain, it 



43G THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OE PHILOSOPHY 

should serve to teach us that the category of clear and 
plain human understanding is destined to recognize its 
function as a subordinate factor of nature. 

Such an understanding of understanding, isuch a 
higher consciousness standing ever behind us, promotes 
a meek pride or a proud meekness which is well distin- 
guished from the mental poverty of theologians, from 
the transcendental distinction between God and the 
world, between creator and creature. To us the perish- 
able soul is not a narrow-minded servant for whom the 
plans of the imperishable monster soul are incomprehen- 
sible. A philosophically educated and self-understanding 
mind is a part of absolute nature. This mind is not only 
a limited human mind, but the mind of the infinite eter- 
nal, omnipotent universe from which it derived the 
faculty of knowing everything knowable. But when this 
mind demands the ability to absolutely know everything, 
it demands that knowledge should be everything, it be- 
comes transcendental and insolent, it misconceives the 
relation of science to infinity. The latter is more than 
science, it is the object of science. 



XV 

CONCLUSION 



The philosopher Herbart declares: "If the meaning 
of a word were determined by the use to which it is put 
by this or that person, then the term metaphysics would 
be ambiguous and scarcely comprehensible. If one 
wishes to know what meaning of this term has been 



CONCLUSION 437 

handed down to us by tradition, he should read the 
ancient metaphysicians and their followers, from Aris- 
totle to Wolff and his school. It will then be found that 
the concepts of being, of its quality, of cause and effect, 
of space and time, have been the objects of this science 
everywhere . . . that it has been attempted to analyze 
them logically and that this has led to all sorts of dis- 
putes. These disputes . . . determined the concept of 
metaphysics." 

Such a declaration is right enough to furnish, by 
the help of a little criticism on our part, a sketch of the 
positive outcome of philosophy. 

Metaphysics has always been the principal part of 
philosophy. In the first sentence of his "Handbook for 
the Elements of Philosophy," Herbart defines philosophy 
as the "analysis of ideas." According to this, meta- 
physics would have to analyze the special ideas of being, 
etc. Now it must be remembered that the idea of being 
is not so much a special concept as the general idea which 
comprises all ideas and all things. Everything belongs 
to being, and to understand that is too much for meta- 
physics. Hence it came into difficulties. Now our 
authority has just explained to us that the concept ot 
metaphysics was not so much determined by the work it 
accomplished as by disputes. It did not work, but only 
made the logical attempt to analyze the concept of being. 
In so doing it led to disputes and did not distinguish itself 
very much as a science. The latter, Kant has told us in 
his preface to his "Critique of Pure Reason," is recog- 
nized by its agreements, not by its disputes. 

The metaphysical disputes were overcome by philo- 
sophic science, which is the study of ideas or understand- 
ing, by arriving at a clear and plain theory of under- 



438 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

standing, the demonstration of which I have here at- 
tempted. 

The faculty of understanding had been transmitted 
to us by our superstitious ancestors as a thing of another 
world. But the illusion of another world is a metaphysi- 
cal one and led to disputes about the idea of being. 

The positive outcome of philosophy assures us and 
demonstrates that there is only one world, that this world 
is the essence of all being, that there are many modes of 
being, but that they all belong to the same common 
nature. Thus philosophy has unified the concept of being 
and overcome metaphysics and its disputes. 

Universal being has only one quality, the natural one 
of general existence. At the same time this quality is 
the essence of all special qualities. Just as the concept 
of herbs includes all herbs, even weeds, so the concept 
of being comprises not only that which is, but also that 
which is not. which was once upon a time and which will 
be in the future. 

To free the concept of being from its metaphysical 
disputes, is a very difficult thing for those who attribute 
an extravagant meaning to the first principle of logic 
which says : "Any subject can have only one of two 
radically different predicates, because it cannot be at the 
same time A and not-A." 

All previous science of understanding has really re- 
volved around this statement. It is based on something 
plausible, but still more on misunderstanding. Only 
when w r e have become aware of what has finally been the 
outcome of the science of understanding, only when this 
statement is backed up by the positive product of philoso- 
phy, does this stubbornly maintained and much contested 
statement receive a lasting value by its just modification. 



CONCLUSION 439 

In the first place, a "subject" is not a fixed, but a 
variable concept. In the last analysis, as we have suf- 
ficiently explained in this work, there is only one sole 
universal subject which is nowhere radically different. 

The first principle of the old and tried Aristotlean 
logic tells us that a man, a subject, who is lame cannot 
move about with alacrity. But I have a friend who was 
totally lame and who today jumps about briskly ; there is 
no contradiction in this. But if I tell another man about 
my lame friend and in the course of my story have this 
lame subject all of a sudden jumping over chairs and 
tables, then such a thing is inconceivable and I contradict 
myself. Such a contradiction is a violation of all logic, 
but not because agility and lameness are totally different 
predicates which cannot be attributed to the same sub- 
ject, nor because the contradiction cannot exist. Being 
is full of contradictions, but they are not simultaneous or 
without mediation. A logical speech or story must not 
forget to mediate. By mediation, all contradictions are 
solved. And this is the outcome of philosophy. 

In discordant metaphysics, being and not being are 
irreconcilable and mutually exclusive contradictions. 
Metaphysics is in doubt whether this common existence 
is real or only apparent, or whether there is not some- 
where in a heaven above the clouds an entirely different 
life. But philosophy is now fully aware that even the 
most fictitious being is so positively real that any nega- 
tion which appearances may attribute to it is outclassed 
by affirmation to the utter discomfiture of the former. 
Being and its affirmation is absolute, negation and not 
being are only relative. Being is everywhere and always 
dominant, so that there is no non-existence. Though we 
may say that this or that is nothing, yet we must remain 



440 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

conscious that anything we may call nothing is still 
something very positive. There cannot be any ignorance 
which does not at least know a little. There is no evil 
which cannot be transformed into good. The things that 
have been, will be, and are, all of them are. There is 
no non-existence. It is at least a word, though it does 
not convey any meaning. The world and our language 
are of so positive a character that even a meaningless 
word still means something. Nothing cannot be ex- 
pressed. 

The superstition of another "true" world which floats 
above this world of phenomena or is secretly hidden 
behind it has so vitiated logic that it is now difficult to 
remove the discordant metaphysical "concept of being" 
from the human mind. The belief in something abso- 
lutely different will not easily disappear. It is especially 
difficult to demonstrate that conceived things are of the 
same nature as real things, that both of them really be- 
long to true nature. 

Conceived things are pictures, real pictures, pictures 
of reality. All the limbs of an imaginary dragon are 
copied from nature. Such creations of imagination are 
distinguished from truths only by their fanciful composi- 
tion. To connect nature and human life according to the 
given order, that is the whole function of understanding. 
Knowing, thinking, understanding, explaining, has not, 
and cannot have, any other function but that of describ- 
ing the processes of experience by division or classifica- 
tion. The famous scientist Haeckel may call this con- 
temptuously "museum zoology" and "herbarium bot- 
any." but he simply shows that he has not grasped the 
secret of the intellect, but still wonders at it in a meta- 
physical way, the same as his predecessors. 



„ _— -~-'"~ CONCLUSION 441 

What Darwin ascertained about the "origin of spe- 
cies" and about the transitions and evolutions in organic 
life is a very valuable expansion of museum zoology. 
Whoever expects anything else from the nature of intel- 
lectual faculties, shows that he is not familiar with the 
outcome of philosophy, that he has not emancipated him- 
self from the vain wondering and its accompanying edifi- 
cation, which the wonder of human intelligence caused 
to primitive ignorance. 

Understanding has hitherto been in error about itself 
and was, therefore, inadequately equipped for the task of 
giving a true account of its relatives, of the phenomena 
of nature and life. Nevertheless it has acquired training 
in the course of culture and has progressively accom- 
plished better things. Its errors have never been value- 
less, and its truths will never be sufficient. That this is 
so, is not due to the defective condition of our intelligence, 
but to the inexhaustibleness of being, the indescribable 
wealth of nature. 

The self-conscious, philosophically trained under- 
standing and intelligence has now the means of knowing 
that the accuracy of all investigation is limited, that for 
this reason all its future results will be affected by error. 
But a science which is backed up by such an enlightened 
understanding, is reconciled to its limitations and trans- 
forms them into a hall of glory. Self-conscious limita- 
tion is aware of its partnership in the absolute perfection 
of the universe. 

The self-conscious intellect improved by the positive 
product of philosophy knows that it can understand, de- 
scribe, the whole world in a natural, sensible way. There 
is nothing that can resist it. But in the sense of a tran- 
scendental metaphysics, our understanding is not worthy 



1 12 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OF PHILOSOPHY 

of that name. In return, this metaphysics is pure vagary 
in the eyes of critical reason. 

Taking its departure from fantastical ideals, from 
contradictions, especially between being and not being, 
metaphysics has gradually transformed itself in the 
course of civilization and become philosophy, which in 
its turn has progressed step by step the same as all other 
science. 

Philosophy was at first impelled by the nebulous de- 
sire for universal world wisdom and has finally assumed 
the form of a lucid special investigation of the theory of 
understanding. 

This theory is part, and the most essential part at 
that, of psychology or the science of the soul. Modern 
psychologists have at least devined, if not recognized, 
that the human soul is not a metaphysical thing, but a 
phenomenon. Like Professor Haeckel, they also com- 
plain about the dead classification in their specialty. The 
human soul is presented to them as a multitude of facul- 
ties. There is the faculty of understanding, of feeling, 
of perceiving, etc., without number and end. But how is 
life infused into them? Where is the consistent connec- 
tion ? 

There is, for instance, the conception and feeling of 
beauty in the human soul. The beautiful again is divided 
into the artistically beautiful and the ethically beautiful, 
and each of these into other subdivisions. There is 
beside the beautiful also the pretty, the charming, the 
graceful, the dignified, the noble, the solemn, the splen- 
did, the pathetic, the touching. Psychology also treats of 
the ridiculous, of the joke, the wit, the satire, the irony, 
the humor, of a thousand subtleties and distinctions, the 



CONCLUSION 443 

ideological separation of which it attempts just as do 
botany, zoology, and every other sience in their field. 

To all of them, being is the object of study. What 
is the use of metaphysics under these circumstances? 
Only because it had in mind a different being, a trans- 
cendental one, could it induce Kant to sum up all his 
studies in the question: How is metaphysics possible as 
a science? 

It is the merit of philosophy to have demonstrated 
that metaphysics is possible only as fantastical specula- 
tion. 

It is the business of metaphysics to treat being tran- 
scendentally. It is the business of special sciences to 
classify being after the manner of herbarium botany. 
Classical order is already present in the vegetable king- 
dom, otherwise no specialist in botany could classify it. 

But the objective arrangement of the vegetable king- 
dom in infinitely more multiform than the subjective ar- 
rangement of botany. The latter is always excellent, if 
it corresponds to the scientific progress of its period. Who- 
ever is looking for absolute botany or psychology, or for 
any other absolute science, misunderstands the univer- 
sally natural character of the absolute as well as the 
relative special character of the human faculty of under- 
standing. 

Philosophy familiar with its historical achievement 
understands being as the infinite material of life and 
science which is taken up by the special sciences and 
classified by them. It teaches the specialists to remem- 
ber throughout all their classifications according to de- 
partments and concepts that all specialties are connected 
by life and not so separated in life as they are in science, 
but that they are flowing and passing into one another. 



444 THE POSITIVE OUTCOME OE PHILOSOPHY 

Thus our science of understanding finally culminates 
in the rule : Thou shalt sharply divide and subdivide and 
farther subdivide to the utmost the universal concept, 
the concept of the universe, but thou shalt be backed up 
by the consciousness that this mental classification is a 
formality by which man seeks for the sake of his in- 
formation to register and to place his experience ; thou 
shalt furthermore remain aware of thy liberty to pro- 
gressively improve the experience acquired by thyself 
in the course of time", by modifying thy classification. 

Things are ideas, ideas are names, and things, ideas, 
and names arc subject to continuous perfection. 

Stable motion and mobile stability constitute the 
reconciling contradiction which enables us to reconcile 
all contradictions. 



THE END 



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